everyone knows the song here in bali... and invariably as soon as i tell them that i:m from california... they just can:t help themselves from breaking into a beautiful but heavily accented few bars of the classic eagles tune...
harmless right...as if to say... i know you... i connect with you and no we can:t understand all the words either but at least we have the excuse of english not being our first or even second language, what was your excuse again?
however, as fundamental christians to the bible, the balians take our songs quite literally and that is where our story begins... right at the line that goes... "you can come, but you can never leave..."
my last 24 hours have been directly out of a salvadore dali or mc escher painting... there is something reminesent of life as i knew it but as in either of the above masters' works, something just isn:t quite right, is it the mind playing tricks or have i slipped into a slightly alternative universe where normal is anything but and i:m left with the only sureity that it's just not going to make sense or come fully into focus no matter how long i stare at it...
i am on my way home... or so i thought... and having reached the final day i was busy with the usual last minute things... one last swim in the ocean... once last juice at my favorie juice place... one more trip up and down the drag on my sexy fuschia scooter, a mad dash to buy all the gifts i meant to buy throughout my trip but hadn:t, and trying to remember all the placese that i had left luggage so i didn:t have to take it on the next leg of my trip, promising to return in a day or two that just never quite happened... and so as i was checking things off my list... i sent my confirmation e-mail Kim... who among many other roles, is the friend that picks me up from the airport... and those of you lucky enough to have a friend like that... well, then you know how special that friend is (gotta get points for that one) Now i looked at my return ticket... leaving at midnight wed. night... all day layover in tokyo, on to LA following morning... using my highly toned mental acuity i did the math and confirmed my friday morning arrival... and that's when the floor fell out from under me and although i didn:t remember taking the red pill... i certainly wasn:t in Kansas anymore...
with that being an extemely long set up, i may now tell you that i do not arrive on friday as i thought but rather thursday morning... literally 6 hours before i leave japan... basically i should be touching down right now according to the bizarro world that i've slipped into... and yet here i am with 5 more hours before i will board my plane that is set to travel back in time... so if there is anything you want to know about tomorrow, you can ask as i seem to be there...
now, normally this change in reality would be but a small tweek in the plan... grabbing a cab and not bothering to ask kim for a ride on a work day... but the plot is considerably thicker...
as part of a national conspiracy by the balinese to not have me leave their country, they staged a city wide blackout at the exact moment that i was withdrawing money from a local ATM in the beach town of Kuta just an hour before i left for the airport... with the power out for a mere 60 seconds... the machine which rebooted effortlessly, simply erased my transaction...keeping my card as a souvenir... however that left me whit...no money, no card... the teenagers working at the mini-mart laughed and played their role to the end, innocently repeating ...too late, bank:s closed, come back tomorrow... somehow not understanding that i was on my way to the airport and needed some money to close out hotel, taxi, exit tax etc... not to mention that although i have been on vacation for two months... my ATM card has been working overtime and it was looking forward to a long overdue vacation of its own which i had thoroughly promised it and didn:t very well want to go back on my word and leave it trapped in Bali...
after scrounging through pockets, i had enough money to get to the airport and even pay exit tax... however... i overstayed my visa by 6 days... which although i generally respect international laws, it seems a little weird that a country whose gross national income is more than 90% derived from tourism to be that upset that i spent 6 extra days in their country doing my best to spend as much money as possible to support their economy... but it was literally like a scene out of Goodfellows, The Godfather, or whatever other mafia-esqe movie as i was ushered into small immigration office and told that i needed to pay the equivalent of $120 US as a penalty...I told them that although that seemed like a lot, i would normally be happy to pay it because i was in the wrong... but due to extenuating circumstances...well after feigning interest in my explanation of loss of my ATM card and not having that much money on me they replied simply... "then you cannot leave the country"... and they showed me the door...
i plowed through my luggage and found $70 leaving me $50 short which i spent the next 2 hours trying every way possible to raise... including the worst street performance of "tomorrow" (think Annie) and passing the hat... but even if people agreed that the sun would indeed come up tomorrow, they must have assumed that it would whether i was in LA or Bali and didn:t feel moved enough to part with more than smile and an inward laugh...
in the end, we worked out a deal... one that i:m pretty sure they got the better end of...(please read with dripping sarcasm)
and so here i am... traveling first class without a penny on my person and no way of getting more until i get to the nearest wells fargo which surprising doesn:t have a branch in the Narita airport...
moral of the story... i still need a ride from the airport...
but before i go into that i want to give a quick word of gratitude to corrupt government officials whom without, i would still be in Bali, with no exit in the near future....
now, after the first hour or so... it seemed that everyone at Japan airlines, the whole immigration staff, the money exchangers, the street vendors, and most of the departing passsengers knew my situation and while amused where all quite clear that they could not help except by offering sage advice such as... why don:t you just borrow money from a friend... or the deeply provacative question..."why did you overstay your visa?" (yes i know many of you are asking the same thing, and it is a valid question, but in the moment of truth, that answer didn:t seem to get me any closer to a solution on how i was going to make my plane... and the genuinely humane repeating of my situation to me as if to make sure that i fully understood the gravity with which i had caused myself...that went like this..
them: "you overstayed your visa."
me: "yes"
them:"you need to pay $1,200,000 rupia to leave"
me: "yes"
them: "you don't have enough money."
me: " yes"
them: "you have big problem"
me: "you lost me... i'm sorry i don't understand... what problem?... oh the fact that i can't leave the country, and every day i stay my fine goes up, and i can:t reschedule my flight because i booked through american airlines and japan airlines is not authorized to reschedule a flight for me... and even if they were authorized they weren't sure there was any space on the flights in the next couple days... and that i have very little money...certainly not enough for taxi, hotel, and food for next 24 hours... with only a hope but no guarantee that i'll ever be able to get my card even if i do stay and on top of everything else i'm starting my period...
ok... i didn't say all that... i sat there and took my lumps, trying to think what MacGuyver, James Bond, or even Mr. Bean would do... surely there must be a way... isn't there always a way... and then after the 15th time of taking with different immigration guards... officers... whatever... they were the gatekeeper and i was hoping that i would find one of them who would take a liking to me as the rich white capitalist brother or son that he never had and risk his career forging my documents to sneak me out of the country... and finally after giving my best... "alright you broke me, i'll do anything... just name it" look the guard threw it out there...
"maybe you have something you could sell... maybe a phone or a camera... he said it softly, and at first i wasn't sure i heard him correctly, then thought he was honestly trying to brainstorm but then although it didn't let it show... it hit me... this was the oldest one in the books... and i walked right into it... might as well have been redford and newman working me for all i had...
so they could be bought... that was the message... but it wasn't going to be cheap... and so there i was... clock ticking... what was i going to do... stay and take my chances with finding a place to stay, rebooking my flight and getting my atm card back or "doing a deal" with my camera...
now many of you may not know the deep irony of this part of the story but i have very weird camera karma and in the last 2 years i have gone through 3 cameras all with very contraversial circumstances as to their disappearances... and here i was again, about to "lose" my camera...
so i walked back into the immigration office and it was hilarious... within minutes there were 4 guards working the mark (that would be me) they would look at the camera, say something in indonesian then ask me a question... each time creating a little confusion and widdling away precious minutes before i needed to board...
then one grabbed the camera and said he had to check with his boss... and told me to wait in outer office... another came and wrote down and number on the newspaper in front of me as if to say... i give you this much for it... was this really happening...
soon the guy that took my camera came back out and started helping a different customer... like he had never seen me before and then i thougth i may have just lost my one poker chip and really what could i do about it... i followed him and his new customer into the office and said i needed to go... was it a deal or not...
he grabbed the camera and walked me out... giving it back to me and telling me that it would be better if i sold it and just gave them the money vs them keeping it in exchange for my passage... me sell it... okay... anyone want to buy my camera for a couple hundred dollars so i can leave the country? that didn't seem like a very good option but at least i had the camera back...
but on my way out i saw the guard who wrote the number on the newspaper and figured, i mighth as well ask... walked up to him and said... it:s yours if you have the money on you...
he nodded for me to take a walk with him... somewhere no doubt a little quieter to do our illegal deal...
and within minutes it was done... and within another few i was stamped and on my way to my gate...
and there it was... my first real bribe (and by first i mean 3rd or fourth... I lived in mexico for a while and it was just a part of life down there) and i guess it:s like the old saying goes... a picture is worth a thousand words... but a camera may be your ticket home...
so again if anyone wants to pick me up that would be great... and yes i thought about trying to explain my situation to a taxi driver in the hopes that he saw the movie pay it forward and was waiting for an opportunity like me to fulfill his part of the forward...
i:ve even visualized the exchange...
me: hello
him: where to?
me: just santa monica... you see i:m just coming off a two month vacation in asia where i had my own personal driver and don:t have any more money on me so would you mind doing this fare pro bono?
him: that:s interesting... you see... i:m coming off of a 12 hour shift and haven:t have a day off in two months...ummm sure i:d love to give you a ride for free and why don:t we stop at urth cafe for a salad and a juice, my treat... and then i can play hookie the rest of the day and be your driver... you know, to ease your re-entry so to speak...
me: gee thanks... you sure are swell...
however... in the rare event that it doesn:t work that way... (besides rhonda brittan having some serious explaining to do) i:m hoping that i can buy him off with a couple bootlegged copies of the latest movies that i bought on the black market in Thailand.
flirting with the dark side...
jeff vader
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
you talkin to me?... you talkin to me? (think DeNiro)
okay... so we all know the line from Taxi driver that DeNiro immortalized as only DeNiro can... but I have a confession to make.... I never got it... there i said it... i mean sure i've quoted it and i quote lots of things that I don't know what they mean, but in this case i understood what i was saying, i just never got why it was such a memorable phrase... until now that is...
yes, among many other things, one of which being the proper use of the gerund...this 3 decade mystery has been cleared up in my short stay on this utopian island in the south pacific...
now, i'll get to DeNiro in a second... but before i go on, i don't want to lose anyone this early by making a reference to an obscure part of the english language and leaving you "hanging" ( inside joke for the english majors in the group)
According to Wikipedia... In English the gerund is often identical in form to the present participle (ending in -ing) and can behave as a verb within a clause (so that it may be modified by an adverb or have an object), but the clause as a whole (sometimes consisting only of one word, the gerund) acts as a noun within the larger sentence.
translation... words that end with ING... shopping, looking, buying, etc can all be gerunds...
now by themselves they are relatively harmless but when you add the voodoo that is prevalent in this part of the world with a gerund said twice in quick succession... well now you have a force that would rank among the best of the jedi mind tricks
here's how it works...
they say...
shopping, shopping
i say... just looking, looking ( involuntarily repeating the gerund and unknowingly already under their spell)
they say... buying, buying
and i give them my money, money ( not a gerund but certainly the end of the ritual)
tomorrow i'm off to see an old green wise one who is rumored to have the antidote... which i can already hear him saying... buy or not buy, there is no looking (green as in yoda not kermit if you were using the wrong accent in your head it will make even less sense)...
now back to our regular scheduled blog... "you talkin to me... deNiro...bali and me saying things that i don't know the meaning of... which is different than saying things i don't mean or saying mean things... but i digress...
now before i explain, i would love to pretend that i cracked some amazingly intricate ancient formula, the likes of which would be comperable to finding the Rosetta stone but unfortunately, the Balinese favor simplicity... however in this case i think there is an argument that sometimes simplicity is the basis for confusion... and that less is "not" actually more, (example of one of the quotes i use often without any idea of how it exactly makes sense, but i guess "it is what it is" (another example) but you know... "it's all good" (yes i could go on forever, and if it wasn't for the one fact that made the $60k+ that i spent on my college education and all of the nonsensical, lost meaning languaging that comprises most of my verbal interactions in the world i would feel that i definitely did not deserve to graduate cum laude in communications... and what is that magic fact?... that 90% of all communication is non-verbal communication (how many have heard this... and without a single idea of how this could possibly be accurate, proven or even relevant, i have total peace with myself, my degree, and my propensity to speak in euphenisms, cliches, movie lines, and slang, having total confidence that the "non-verbal" (which is just a fancy latin word that means "not verbal") part of me is communicating what i'm actually trying to say... but i feel that i'm getting a little off the subject... in fact i'm not even sure that i've established a subject... but more of a question comprised of two pronouns a preposition and a gerund... which is important so please make a mental note....
okay, back to the mystery uncovered...and it all revolved around the names of the people i've met here in Bali...
i learned early from old Dale Carnegie that the sweet sound in any language is a persons name... and that if you want to win friends and influence people then you gotta remember their names...(the footnote is of course if you are someone's superior in any way, or a tourist who's money represents the sole means to feed one's family, then you are exempt from this rule because in both cases people still have to pretend to like you and be influenced by you)
and because while traveling i am often overconfident in my Jeffness, i have felt both of the above have steadily applied and therefore have dropped any need to even try and remember anyone's name that i've met...
but try as i might not to pay attention, within a couple days of being here i couldn't help myself asking each person to repeat his/her name... not because i was suddenly more interested or remembered that we are all equal in the eyes of God... but rather because i kept hearing the same couple names...
it seemed that every single person i met was named Wayan, Made', Komang, or Ketut...
turns out that in Bali people are named according to the birth order in the following way...
you see in Bali names for children go according to birth order... and here's the order
Wayan for first born
Made' (Maday)
Komang for 3rd born
Ketut for 4th born
If there are more than four kids as they usually do (average family size in Bali is 13.4 children), they start over with the 5th born reverting back to the list for 1st born children.
oh, and before i forget, it doesn't matter boy or girl... same names for either...
so in the first 48 hours i was in Bali i met over 100 Wayans, 70 Made's, 50 Komangs', and 45 Ketuts'
at first i saw only the brilliance of this plan... first i had at least a 25% chance of guessing anyone in the country's name and getting it right (big boost for my desire to have psychic superpowers), i only had to learn and remember 4 new names to cover everyone i'll meet on my trip, and lastly i couldn't help feeling the peaceful effect this must have on the prebirth conversations with friends who are having babies... no keeping the name a secret, no waiting to see if it's a boy or girl, no spending countless nights pouring through those annoying kids names books that can easily go into the 1000's of pages, and no pressure of mistakingly naming (marking) a child for the rest of it's life with a name that you liked in a song you heard when you where in Spain one summer, only to find out after the birth certificate was signed that the word actually means "devil's little helper"
but then as can often happen when things seem a bit too good to be true...the other shoe dropped...
in numerous examples i ended talking to the wrong Wayan... the wrong Ketut, the wrong everyone...
the other day i was in the market and then looking for my driver (yes, i have a driver... his name's wayan and i highly recommend him) anyway i called out his name... and like 450 people turned and said.... "you takin to me?"
to which i replied... wayan wayan... driving driving...
as if in a trance they all when to their vehicles and waited for me to give them further instructions....
"way to go young baiettowalker..."(the wise little green one's voice heard softly as if inside my head...
may the force be with you,
j
Saturday, April 18, 2009
deal or no deal?
seriously what's the deal with getting a deal? i'm not sure exactly but it is definitely a BIG deal...let's face it, we all love a deal... and love is not nearly a strong enough word for most of us...
because of that i realize what i'm about to try to do is as improbable as asking that nobody exchange gifts and that we actually celebrate the real meaning of Christmas, or that everyone stop watching the current news networks and demand more inspirational reporting, or that any of my blogs will be readable in less than an hour (except for my mom... very fast reader who routinely devours three to four 400+ page books a week, although if asked she admittedly can only speak in broad strokes of plots and story lines, which means, either she is skipping large segments or has poor retention, either way allowing me to feel totally confident that i can put these last three lines in and have a 90% chance that they sneak by undetected and i will still get a "glad your safe, sounds like you're having a great time" note after she reads this entry.
okay back to my seemly insurmountable feat... attempting to sell (don't you love the irony) you on the idea of not getting the best deal possible when buying something. I know, you can go ahead and say it... "that's crazy talk"... i mean we are a nation that will do anything and everything to get the best deal. Epitimized by the lengths we are willing to go on the friday after thanksgiving when retailers across the country offer incredible savings, sales, and discounts of all kinds on their products. Such a madhouse has this day become that some places open up as early as 5am to handled the throngs of bargain shoppers who have camped out all night, trained all year and are ready to max out every piece of plastic they have as fast as possible. The stores bring in tons of additional staff to accommodate the hairied masses as they devour inventory determined to break last year's buying record no matter what. Walmart alone does well over a billion dollars in sales every year that one day. So, yes, i get what i'm up against... but didn't they say "shoot for the moon and if you miss at least you'll land among the stars"... however "they" obviously don't get how the sky works because the moon is way closer than the stars so if you miss the moon you would have to really really over shoot it, and we're talking by like millions of lightyears... unlikely... or you would fall among the nothingness... which i know doesn't make for as catchy of a cliche but at least it would be astronomically accurate... and of course they could always say "shoot for the stars, and if you miss, maybe, just maybe you'll hit the moon... but really what kind of odds does anyone have of that happening?... the more i think about it, it's a dumb saying no matter how you say it and i'm sorry that i used it... won't happen again.
okay back to "getting the best deal"... i mean it's one thing if we confine this behavior to our country but unfortunately we cannot... and nowhere does it become more prevelent than when we go on our "cultural adventures" to less developed countries. These are countries that we see on the national geographic channel and previously were reserved to being visited only by missionaries, the peace corp., and designer clothing companies (you know "sweatshops"... stay with me). However, over the last several decades what started as urban legend has been confirmed too many times to be ignored by our consumer hungry nation...word is out on the low prices for crafts, textiles, jewelry, and every other product, all made by hand that these countries offer. Turns out that these "less developed" countries are like the day after thanksgiving all year long.
now i've never been a shopper in the states but ever since my first trip to mexico in high school i have been dramatically addicted to bartering, technical term used in 3rd world countries which roughly translates to "shopping for things you totally didn't know that you absolutely couldn't live without including but not limited to the 3 buddhas statue combo that made a play on the hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil usually reserved for the primate family but when I saw it I thought, "spiritual, but not so serious, i've gotta have it".
You see "bartering" is not so much about shopping as it is about a challenge of the wits, a dualing of the minds... an epic battle where instincts are everything and there simply is no room for error. And i've waged battle with the best of them... from the onyx chess set with figures of Mayan gods that i emerged with in mexico, to the spoils of decorative bull whips made from actual bull genitalia that i claimed in Spain... oh there have been duals for ponchos, wall coverings, dresses (they were gifts), keychains, necklaces, masks, carvings, and even a 75 pound foot stool ornately carved in the shape of an elephant (that one was a draw as i forgot about the "getting it home" thing.
anyway, i didn't care what it was, or who was selling it... if they wanted to play, i was in..
"Sir, sir, for you good price?"
(game on) "how much?" i ask
"$fifty-een" (sounded like 15 but i know it must be $50 since the item in question is a 7 piece old forest teak serving bowl set that would easily go for $200-$300 in the states... yes i did my homework... and i travel with the most recent pottery barn catalogue just in case i need to confer on an odd item i haven't commited to memory.)
$50? cockily... "you think i was born yesterday?" (for future reference... this doesn't translate in most languages and makes me seem a little "retarded"....so my opponent softens possibly feeling a bit sorry for me, but then his primal inner capitalist smells blood and he doesn't hesitate to strike.
"No for you sir, very special prices... my first sale... good price...How much you pay? tell me how much?"
lighting like calculations all done in my head...(inner dialogue..."okay, as i said, in the states i would easily pay $200-300 and the guidebook said, divide that number in half (that's the rule...and then my rule (advanced bartering, not for first timers) divide in half again in case i need a little room.
alright $200 (already starting on the low side...i'm merciless) divided by 2 = 100 divided by 2 = $50 (remember this is all being done at lighting speed... not even noticible to the naked eye) and then because i'm feeling fisty, half one more time for good measure... he's never going to know what hit him."
(back to external dialogue, overkill but i'm a perfectionist) "$25... I'll give you $25 (there it is, take it or leave it... slight gleam in my eye, playing it cool hand luke cool... i even show him the $25...i've thrown the bait, now let's see if he takes it.
and he gives me this "I don't understand" and i know what's coming... my family, my kids, blah blah blah, leave it at the door, i'm sure they're great people but this is about business now what's it going to be..."
a little confused look and i know i have him against the ropes... "... okay $25, thank you."
but i'm not done playing with him... i still want to draw him out... is that the best price or is there even more room, so i use it... the secret weapon, the wild card...
"um, i'll have to think about it amigo (means "arch-enemy" in spanish, or is it swedish... anyway they're all "amigo," in every country... it's much to hard to learn "arch-enemy" in every language so they're all cool with "amigo") and i turn to walk away...(cut to slow motion like a terintino movie) ... and just as i'm about to take a step i hear it... "$fifty-een ... sir for you, please good price..."
"sold... from $50 to $15 just like that ... " (although now that i think about it... his word for $50 and $15 were so close... could he...no...)... anyway
over the years i would reglegate myself to only certain amounts of engaging in this activity, so as not to lose to0 many days of any trip collecting "gandors" (real word for men's full length onesies, very stylish and all the rage in Morocco, still waiting for them to hit in the US but they say northern africa is always a couple years ahead of us fashion-wise...and other creations of the locals that became my hunting trophies (read "unwanted gifts" for my friends and family) from my bartering quests.
now this trip has been no different... and in Thailand, Cambodia and now Bali, i have again been confronted by this temptation, and i have to admit i was eager to see if I still had it. And so I got back in the ring, and I don't know what to call it... a revelation, a God-moment, a wake up call, call it an onemonopia if you want, but something has happened and I'm forever changed...
In Asia the merchants come equipped not only with razor sharp tongues but with over-sized calculators...and they are not afraid to use them. So the exchange was altered by the glaring realization of what I was actually being asked to pay in dollars. Turns out that I have spent hours, no days, of my life, bartering, debating, arguing and in some cases getting more than a little pissed off at the idea of being taking advantage of over what turns out to be someone bwt $.75 cents and $1.25. And yes in my defense it seemed like a much bigger deal in the local currency but nothing an oversized calculator wouldn't have remedied. Talk about regret...
I mean really, isn't it enought that we have 10-50x the buying power of these people, just because we happen to be born in the US...
now, i don't mind getting a good deal, I mean sure, i deserve a discount for taking my time to fly half way around the world and cutting out all the middlemen... but somehwer in the process i lost myself and it became an egoic powerplay verses the friendly game and sweet cultural exchange that it was originally intended to be.... so from now on it is an attitude of gratitude for me...gratitude for being extremely weathly by most of the world's standards... gratitude for being able to buy basically whatever i want, whenever i want... gratitude for being born in the richest country the world has ever known...and i promise to enjoy circulating my wealth with those who are less fortunate...from now on!
now, every time i buy something that i would have bartered for in the past i will bless the vendor, his wares, and the price he offers... gladly pay it and be on my way... no telling how much more of the countries i will get to see with all the time i save... yes this is one of those pivotal moments where the old competitive, "i win you lose" me stays behind and the new "win win" me heads out into the world standing for cooperation, collaboration, and fair trade... and i know just the purchase to commemorate the beginning of my new journey...hold on, this will just take a second...
(me) how much for the oversized calculators?
(cutest little Balinese boy you've ever seen)"$30,000 rupiah (roughly $3.00), sir, very good price"
(me) "you've gotta be kinding, the guy over there has a sign for $25,000 rupiah ($2.50)do i look like I was born yesterday?... this is straight up thievery... I'm going to send you to the moon and maybe if i miss you can try your "for you, good price" crap on the stars or whatever you land near." (sad attempt at bringing that one back around but i'm still a little worked up over the $.50 that guy just tried to take me for...)
but don't worry friends and family on my gift list... i will find an honest oversized calculator salesmen before i leave if it takes me every day for the rest of my trip...
j money
because of that i realize what i'm about to try to do is as improbable as asking that nobody exchange gifts and that we actually celebrate the real meaning of Christmas, or that everyone stop watching the current news networks and demand more inspirational reporting, or that any of my blogs will be readable in less than an hour (except for my mom... very fast reader who routinely devours three to four 400+ page books a week, although if asked she admittedly can only speak in broad strokes of plots and story lines, which means, either she is skipping large segments or has poor retention, either way allowing me to feel totally confident that i can put these last three lines in and have a 90% chance that they sneak by undetected and i will still get a "glad your safe, sounds like you're having a great time" note after she reads this entry.
okay back to my seemly insurmountable feat... attempting to sell (don't you love the irony) you on the idea of not getting the best deal possible when buying something. I know, you can go ahead and say it... "that's crazy talk"... i mean we are a nation that will do anything and everything to get the best deal. Epitimized by the lengths we are willing to go on the friday after thanksgiving when retailers across the country offer incredible savings, sales, and discounts of all kinds on their products. Such a madhouse has this day become that some places open up as early as 5am to handled the throngs of bargain shoppers who have camped out all night, trained all year and are ready to max out every piece of plastic they have as fast as possible. The stores bring in tons of additional staff to accommodate the hairied masses as they devour inventory determined to break last year's buying record no matter what. Walmart alone does well over a billion dollars in sales every year that one day. So, yes, i get what i'm up against... but didn't they say "shoot for the moon and if you miss at least you'll land among the stars"... however "they" obviously don't get how the sky works because the moon is way closer than the stars so if you miss the moon you would have to really really over shoot it, and we're talking by like millions of lightyears... unlikely... or you would fall among the nothingness... which i know doesn't make for as catchy of a cliche but at least it would be astronomically accurate... and of course they could always say "shoot for the stars, and if you miss, maybe, just maybe you'll hit the moon... but really what kind of odds does anyone have of that happening?... the more i think about it, it's a dumb saying no matter how you say it and i'm sorry that i used it... won't happen again.
okay back to "getting the best deal"... i mean it's one thing if we confine this behavior to our country but unfortunately we cannot... and nowhere does it become more prevelent than when we go on our "cultural adventures" to less developed countries. These are countries that we see on the national geographic channel and previously were reserved to being visited only by missionaries, the peace corp., and designer clothing companies (you know "sweatshops"... stay with me). However, over the last several decades what started as urban legend has been confirmed too many times to be ignored by our consumer hungry nation...word is out on the low prices for crafts, textiles, jewelry, and every other product, all made by hand that these countries offer. Turns out that these "less developed" countries are like the day after thanksgiving all year long.
now i've never been a shopper in the states but ever since my first trip to mexico in high school i have been dramatically addicted to bartering, technical term used in 3rd world countries which roughly translates to "shopping for things you totally didn't know that you absolutely couldn't live without including but not limited to the 3 buddhas statue combo that made a play on the hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil usually reserved for the primate family but when I saw it I thought, "spiritual, but not so serious, i've gotta have it".
You see "bartering" is not so much about shopping as it is about a challenge of the wits, a dualing of the minds... an epic battle where instincts are everything and there simply is no room for error. And i've waged battle with the best of them... from the onyx chess set with figures of Mayan gods that i emerged with in mexico, to the spoils of decorative bull whips made from actual bull genitalia that i claimed in Spain... oh there have been duals for ponchos, wall coverings, dresses (they were gifts), keychains, necklaces, masks, carvings, and even a 75 pound foot stool ornately carved in the shape of an elephant (that one was a draw as i forgot about the "getting it home" thing.
anyway, i didn't care what it was, or who was selling it... if they wanted to play, i was in..
"Sir, sir, for you good price?"
(game on) "how much?" i ask
"$fifty-een" (sounded like 15 but i know it must be $50 since the item in question is a 7 piece old forest teak serving bowl set that would easily go for $200-$300 in the states... yes i did my homework... and i travel with the most recent pottery barn catalogue just in case i need to confer on an odd item i haven't commited to memory.)
$50? cockily... "you think i was born yesterday?" (for future reference... this doesn't translate in most languages and makes me seem a little "retarded"....so my opponent softens possibly feeling a bit sorry for me, but then his primal inner capitalist smells blood and he doesn't hesitate to strike.
"No for you sir, very special prices... my first sale... good price...How much you pay? tell me how much?"
lighting like calculations all done in my head...(inner dialogue..."okay, as i said, in the states i would easily pay $200-300 and the guidebook said, divide that number in half (that's the rule...and then my rule (advanced bartering, not for first timers) divide in half again in case i need a little room.
alright $200 (already starting on the low side...i'm merciless) divided by 2 = 100 divided by 2 = $50 (remember this is all being done at lighting speed... not even noticible to the naked eye) and then because i'm feeling fisty, half one more time for good measure... he's never going to know what hit him."
(back to external dialogue, overkill but i'm a perfectionist) "$25... I'll give you $25 (there it is, take it or leave it... slight gleam in my eye, playing it cool hand luke cool... i even show him the $25...i've thrown the bait, now let's see if he takes it.
and he gives me this "I don't understand" and i know what's coming... my family, my kids, blah blah blah, leave it at the door, i'm sure they're great people but this is about business now what's it going to be..."
a little confused look and i know i have him against the ropes... "... okay $25, thank you."
but i'm not done playing with him... i still want to draw him out... is that the best price or is there even more room, so i use it... the secret weapon, the wild card...
"um, i'll have to think about it amigo (means "arch-enemy" in spanish, or is it swedish... anyway they're all "amigo," in every country... it's much to hard to learn "arch-enemy" in every language so they're all cool with "amigo") and i turn to walk away...(cut to slow motion like a terintino movie) ... and just as i'm about to take a step i hear it... "$fifty-een ... sir for you, please good price..."
"sold... from $50 to $15 just like that ... " (although now that i think about it... his word for $50 and $15 were so close... could he...no...)... anyway
over the years i would reglegate myself to only certain amounts of engaging in this activity, so as not to lose to0 many days of any trip collecting "gandors" (real word for men's full length onesies, very stylish and all the rage in Morocco, still waiting for them to hit in the US but they say northern africa is always a couple years ahead of us fashion-wise...and other creations of the locals that became my hunting trophies (read "unwanted gifts" for my friends and family) from my bartering quests.
now this trip has been no different... and in Thailand, Cambodia and now Bali, i have again been confronted by this temptation, and i have to admit i was eager to see if I still had it. And so I got back in the ring, and I don't know what to call it... a revelation, a God-moment, a wake up call, call it an onemonopia if you want, but something has happened and I'm forever changed...
In Asia the merchants come equipped not only with razor sharp tongues but with over-sized calculators...and they are not afraid to use them. So the exchange was altered by the glaring realization of what I was actually being asked to pay in dollars. Turns out that I have spent hours, no days, of my life, bartering, debating, arguing and in some cases getting more than a little pissed off at the idea of being taking advantage of over what turns out to be someone bwt $.75 cents and $1.25. And yes in my defense it seemed like a much bigger deal in the local currency but nothing an oversized calculator wouldn't have remedied. Talk about regret...
I mean really, isn't it enought that we have 10-50x the buying power of these people, just because we happen to be born in the US...
now, i don't mind getting a good deal, I mean sure, i deserve a discount for taking my time to fly half way around the world and cutting out all the middlemen... but somehwer in the process i lost myself and it became an egoic powerplay verses the friendly game and sweet cultural exchange that it was originally intended to be.... so from now on it is an attitude of gratitude for me...gratitude for being extremely weathly by most of the world's standards... gratitude for being able to buy basically whatever i want, whenever i want... gratitude for being born in the richest country the world has ever known...and i promise to enjoy circulating my wealth with those who are less fortunate...from now on!
now, every time i buy something that i would have bartered for in the past i will bless the vendor, his wares, and the price he offers... gladly pay it and be on my way... no telling how much more of the countries i will get to see with all the time i save... yes this is one of those pivotal moments where the old competitive, "i win you lose" me stays behind and the new "win win" me heads out into the world standing for cooperation, collaboration, and fair trade... and i know just the purchase to commemorate the beginning of my new journey...hold on, this will just take a second...
(me) how much for the oversized calculators?
(cutest little Balinese boy you've ever seen)"$30,000 rupiah (roughly $3.00), sir, very good price"
(me) "you've gotta be kinding, the guy over there has a sign for $25,000 rupiah ($2.50)do i look like I was born yesterday?... this is straight up thievery... I'm going to send you to the moon and maybe if i miss you can try your "for you, good price" crap on the stars or whatever you land near." (sad attempt at bringing that one back around but i'm still a little worked up over the $.50 that guy just tried to take me for...)
but don't worry friends and family on my gift list... i will find an honest oversized calculator salesmen before i leave if it takes me every day for the rest of my trip...
j money
Friday, April 17, 2009
The city of the ruins
Chaing Mai... it was the one thing, the one place that i actually planned to go... the one item on my two month gig that was a definite... i was going to be there for the Thai new year Songkran, water festival... which started thousands of years ago as a sacred clearing of the old year to bring in the new... fast-forward to 2009 and it's the single largest water fight on the planet.
For 3 days the country opens fire on each other (possibly not the best choice of words in light of the recent civil unrest) but truly it is a party of epic porportions... and all is fair game... people are armed with water guns, ballons, pales, buckets, even garbage cans filled with water and if you let down your guard for one minute, well you are going to get soaked. There are parades, singing and dancing in the streets and people of all ages getting each other wet by any means possible (kim, that's a lob... go ahead). I had seen a video on youtube that showed unsuspecting tourists traveling in a tuk tuk (open air 3 wheeled taxi) getting drilled with a tidal wave of water by the workers of a local gas station as they drove by... and that is one of those things that as long as it's not you, it's the funniest thing to see in the world... so, needless to say this was one of the soon to be highlights of my trip and i'm tempted, seriously tempted to just make up a bunch of stories that would create the memory i intended to have, but really why lie when the alternative experience that i had was also so memorable...
Chaing Mai, which i thought the book said was the city of the ruins, turns out it was a typo and meant to read the city of the runs... and it didn't disappoint.
I landed at 9:30am was picked up and was checked into my hotel by 10am and was in the bathroom by 10:01am, again at 10:03, 10:10, 10:30,10:33,10:50,11:15,11:40,11:41,11:42,11:50, 12:01,12:07,12:14,12:19,12:30 and 75 more times before the clock struck 1pm...
this continued for the next 72 hours until my driver came and took me to the airport and i got on a plane back to bangkok.
now i'm not asking for sympathy, i still haven't told you everything... it gave me a chance to watch television guilt free and i didn't realize what i was missing, no wonder so many people spend 3-4 hours a night in front of their set... how else could one possibly see the same news reported by 325 different stations enough times to see if they were using any different words or if it was a true exact replica from the earlier broadcast or the other networks broadcast. Multiply this by the 4 languages that i was able to watch but not understand the events of the day that were deamed newsworthy and you have got yourself a never ending cycle of pure unadulterated entertainment. Now as far as i can discern there two stories that were so important that they literally were the news for this entire 72 hour period. Now again, i couldn't understand what they were saying but here's what i got...
1. the country of thailand was under martial law and most of the country had already been killed or mamed... and the rest left for dead... there were burning buses, smoke bombs, sprays of machine gun fire and angry mobs pileging the city in biblical proportions. Now the good news was that in the midst of all this chaos it was still easy to see who was on who's side. The rebels were sporting red shirts, and the goverment, well the government's side could wear any color they wanted except red. I thought that was a very good idea... i mean if everyone is in camo, things could get very confusing.
2. and the second most important thing that was happening in the entire would was that the Obama family got a dog, a little black and white dog, with a rich portugese heritege and can literally stay in the water all day...
Now if this isn't a perfect example of ying and yang, dark and light. i really get why these two stories rose above all others and became the historical markers for April 13-15, 2009. However i felt a little cheated as my stay came to an end. here i had been rivoted on the side of my bed (read toilet) for the better part of 3 days and the "red shirts" just go home and the first dog, still just the one picture with a little rainbow scarf... well needless to say it wasn't the finale i had been set up for...
so here's how i think it should have gone...
after hours, ney days, of the exact same images, same two stories, just when all hope of anything new has vanished...beep, beep, da da beep, beep (do news programs still make that cool noise when there's breaking news?)
in James Earl Jones' voice... "this just in"
cut to an image of the first dog getting on airforce one, a quick good bye bark or two and then the doors close, cut to plane whisking away into the night, cut to landing at Sarangundingawfaradgolsgverfvergonadwerverlaand International Airport (that's the official name for Bangkok's airport, google it... hilarous name... flight attendents start the welcome to speak 15 minutes before landing just to make sure to get the whole name in)
cut to first dog being hustled into a motorcade to the thai parliment building... then nothing for what seems like forever, but because we have short attention spans actually only 2 seconds later, we see leaders from both sides coming out smiling, embracing and promising to work together peacefully in the future.
and is this really so hard to imagine. I mean who doesn't love dogs, and the first dog in its one picutre is sporting a very inclusive and non partisan rainbow scarf... i don't think Thailand has ever had an issue with portugal so like switzerland in that respect...and after resolving their differences and being invited to join the rest of the country for Songkran, well, i can just hear little Bo saying "bring it on" to any and all local gas station attendants.
so i may have missed the local festivities but i feel that i'm more connected to the world at large and up to date on current affairs...
so happy Songkran...
wishing you a very wet and a very regular new year...
For 3 days the country opens fire on each other (possibly not the best choice of words in light of the recent civil unrest) but truly it is a party of epic porportions... and all is fair game... people are armed with water guns, ballons, pales, buckets, even garbage cans filled with water and if you let down your guard for one minute, well you are going to get soaked. There are parades, singing and dancing in the streets and people of all ages getting each other wet by any means possible (kim, that's a lob... go ahead). I had seen a video on youtube that showed unsuspecting tourists traveling in a tuk tuk (open air 3 wheeled taxi) getting drilled with a tidal wave of water by the workers of a local gas station as they drove by... and that is one of those things that as long as it's not you, it's the funniest thing to see in the world... so, needless to say this was one of the soon to be highlights of my trip and i'm tempted, seriously tempted to just make up a bunch of stories that would create the memory i intended to have, but really why lie when the alternative experience that i had was also so memorable...
Chaing Mai, which i thought the book said was the city of the ruins, turns out it was a typo and meant to read the city of the runs... and it didn't disappoint.
I landed at 9:30am was picked up and was checked into my hotel by 10am and was in the bathroom by 10:01am, again at 10:03, 10:10, 10:30,10:33,10:50,11:15,11:40,11:41,11:42,11:50, 12:01,12:07,12:14,12:19,12:30 and 75 more times before the clock struck 1pm...
this continued for the next 72 hours until my driver came and took me to the airport and i got on a plane back to bangkok.
now i'm not asking for sympathy, i still haven't told you everything... it gave me a chance to watch television guilt free and i didn't realize what i was missing, no wonder so many people spend 3-4 hours a night in front of their set... how else could one possibly see the same news reported by 325 different stations enough times to see if they were using any different words or if it was a true exact replica from the earlier broadcast or the other networks broadcast. Multiply this by the 4 languages that i was able to watch but not understand the events of the day that were deamed newsworthy and you have got yourself a never ending cycle of pure unadulterated entertainment. Now as far as i can discern there two stories that were so important that they literally were the news for this entire 72 hour period. Now again, i couldn't understand what they were saying but here's what i got...
1. the country of thailand was under martial law and most of the country had already been killed or mamed... and the rest left for dead... there were burning buses, smoke bombs, sprays of machine gun fire and angry mobs pileging the city in biblical proportions. Now the good news was that in the midst of all this chaos it was still easy to see who was on who's side. The rebels were sporting red shirts, and the goverment, well the government's side could wear any color they wanted except red. I thought that was a very good idea... i mean if everyone is in camo, things could get very confusing.
2. and the second most important thing that was happening in the entire would was that the Obama family got a dog, a little black and white dog, with a rich portugese heritege and can literally stay in the water all day...
Now if this isn't a perfect example of ying and yang, dark and light. i really get why these two stories rose above all others and became the historical markers for April 13-15, 2009. However i felt a little cheated as my stay came to an end. here i had been rivoted on the side of my bed (read toilet) for the better part of 3 days and the "red shirts" just go home and the first dog, still just the one picture with a little rainbow scarf... well needless to say it wasn't the finale i had been set up for...
so here's how i think it should have gone...
after hours, ney days, of the exact same images, same two stories, just when all hope of anything new has vanished...beep, beep, da da beep, beep (do news programs still make that cool noise when there's breaking news?)
in James Earl Jones' voice... "this just in"
cut to an image of the first dog getting on airforce one, a quick good bye bark or two and then the doors close, cut to plane whisking away into the night, cut to landing at Sarangundingawfaradgolsgverfvergonadwerverlaand International Airport (that's the official name for Bangkok's airport, google it... hilarous name... flight attendents start the welcome to speak 15 minutes before landing just to make sure to get the whole name in)
cut to first dog being hustled into a motorcade to the thai parliment building... then nothing for what seems like forever, but because we have short attention spans actually only 2 seconds later, we see leaders from both sides coming out smiling, embracing and promising to work together peacefully in the future.
and is this really so hard to imagine. I mean who doesn't love dogs, and the first dog in its one picutre is sporting a very inclusive and non partisan rainbow scarf... i don't think Thailand has ever had an issue with portugal so like switzerland in that respect...and after resolving their differences and being invited to join the rest of the country for Songkran, well, i can just hear little Bo saying "bring it on" to any and all local gas station attendants.
so i may have missed the local festivities but i feel that i'm more connected to the world at large and up to date on current affairs...
so happy Songkran...
wishing you a very wet and a very regular new year...
Thursday, April 9, 2009
the amber lantern
my last name is baietto... and unless you don't speak english you know that makes me italian... in fact baietto is italian for italian, although in the old country it was spelled ïtaliano." however, there was a mix up at Ellis island when my great grandparents landed and they were filling out the forms. my great grandpa confused the boxes for nationality and surname and put baietto for both making it appear that my last name actually meant italian in italian and so America, the melting pot that it is, quickly adopted it as a more authentic english word for italian...
i tell you all this, to tell you that i love pizza... i just had pizza tonight in Cambodia and it was fantastic! and as i was devouring my 13th piece i started remeniscing about my childhood and what an intergral role pizza played and all the fond memories i have associated with it. One of the memories that tops that list was a semi-tradition that my family had on many a thursday night, when we would journey to the Amber Lantern for pizza... now, before i go any further, just in case there are any italians reading this, in no way do i want you get the idea that we only had pizza on thursday nights. in fact i was well into college before i even considered the possibility that one could have a diet that didn't consist of pizza for at least one meal a day.
But the Amber Lantern was special, it was an all you could eat pizza buffet. let me say that again, (actually i think it's enough that i say, "let me say that again"without actually repeating the whole phrase don't you? and compound that with the fact that I was a pre-teen in the middle of my growth spurt years with a metabolism rate that they have only seen on some of the specimens they tested in area 51 but still don't know how to speak of in human terms... and this was as close to italian heaven as it came.
they had thin crust, thick crust, soft crust, hard crust, crust with cheese in the middle....they had, pepperoni pizza, sausage pizza, cheese, mushroom, sausage and pepperoni, pepperoni and mushroom etc... they had the meat lovers, the hawaiian, the 4 cheese, the vegetarian lovers ("which seemed totally ridiculous at the time when our national battle cry was, "where's the beef?" and then they had the dessert pizzas; chocolate pizza, fruit pizza, some great sweet cinnamon pizza, and on and on it went... and no matter how cheaply they could make those bad boys there is no way that they didn't lose money every single Thurs. night that we raided their establishment.
why am i telling you all this... well the moral of the story if you haven't figured it out already is that this post is about massages in Thailand (and Cambodia for that matter)... i apologize to those of you who saw this coming a mile away but for the slower peeps in the group, i didn't want to leave you behind and then have you e-mailing me trying to figure out what i meant by "now that's a happy ending"when i finally get to that part of the post...
so every massage parlor over here, and they are literally everywhere, (think starbucks in terms of locations) is an Amber Lanter (i know there's a "red light" joke there somewhere but i'm not going to go there)
and the menu is no less impressive... they have Thai massage, swedish massage, foot massage, head and neck massage, oil massage, lotion massage, oily lotion massage, and swedish oily lotion thai massage... they have 1 hr massages, 1.5 hr massages, 2 hour massages, and even all day or night massages, they have bulk rooms and private rooms, and mainy will come to your room (house, hotel, office, etc. and then there are the "special"massages but that is a different conversation, just in case Sister Mary Sponsa, Sister Mary Robertine or any of the other Sister Mary's that played a prominent role in my child rearing years are following my blog.
But here's the best part... the price. now i know often quality is way better than quantity but the best is quality and quantity which is what they have going on over here. 1 hour massages can range from $6-$15, a two hour massage from $15-$30, and a four hand (that's two girls for the non-math majors in the group... for an 8 hour massage that has two meals served and a friendly pillow fight for 17000 baht or about $50 dollars...
seem to good to be true... yeah that's what i thought, but day after day, night after night, i just couldn't help treating myself... at first i gave myself reasons... "oh you walked so much today, or you just had a really long flight and this will help you adjust," but within 3 days i didn't even need a reason as it was completely a part of my routine... get up, brush teeth, get a massage... go for a walk to another massage place, have breakfast... relax while food is digesting with a foot massage... go see a temple... reflect on what i saw with a jasmine aroma oil massage... and so the day would go...
and that's the rub (yes pun intended)... they've got it down to a science... lure us in with there huge menu and no obligation try, try, one time attitude and within an hour your hooked... it's worse than crack cocain... i couldn't quit now if i tried...
i literally started this post 2 hours ago, but about 45 minutes in started shaking from withdrawal, ran to get an amazing $7 full hour Cambodian-Thai oil massage (don't ask) and now i'm back...however i was a little worried that i might not make it to the end without another hit...so i brought a couple of them with me... and as i finish this, one is kneading my feet and the other is gently massaging my shoulders...
now that's a happy ending : )
j
i tell you all this, to tell you that i love pizza... i just had pizza tonight in Cambodia and it was fantastic! and as i was devouring my 13th piece i started remeniscing about my childhood and what an intergral role pizza played and all the fond memories i have associated with it. One of the memories that tops that list was a semi-tradition that my family had on many a thursday night, when we would journey to the Amber Lantern for pizza... now, before i go any further, just in case there are any italians reading this, in no way do i want you get the idea that we only had pizza on thursday nights. in fact i was well into college before i even considered the possibility that one could have a diet that didn't consist of pizza for at least one meal a day.
But the Amber Lantern was special, it was an all you could eat pizza buffet. let me say that again, (actually i think it's enough that i say, "let me say that again"without actually repeating the whole phrase don't you? and compound that with the fact that I was a pre-teen in the middle of my growth spurt years with a metabolism rate that they have only seen on some of the specimens they tested in area 51 but still don't know how to speak of in human terms... and this was as close to italian heaven as it came.
they had thin crust, thick crust, soft crust, hard crust, crust with cheese in the middle....they had, pepperoni pizza, sausage pizza, cheese, mushroom, sausage and pepperoni, pepperoni and mushroom etc... they had the meat lovers, the hawaiian, the 4 cheese, the vegetarian lovers ("which seemed totally ridiculous at the time when our national battle cry was, "where's the beef?" and then they had the dessert pizzas; chocolate pizza, fruit pizza, some great sweet cinnamon pizza, and on and on it went... and no matter how cheaply they could make those bad boys there is no way that they didn't lose money every single Thurs. night that we raided their establishment.
why am i telling you all this... well the moral of the story if you haven't figured it out already is that this post is about massages in Thailand (and Cambodia for that matter)... i apologize to those of you who saw this coming a mile away but for the slower peeps in the group, i didn't want to leave you behind and then have you e-mailing me trying to figure out what i meant by "now that's a happy ending"when i finally get to that part of the post...
so every massage parlor over here, and they are literally everywhere, (think starbucks in terms of locations) is an Amber Lanter (i know there's a "red light" joke there somewhere but i'm not going to go there)
and the menu is no less impressive... they have Thai massage, swedish massage, foot massage, head and neck massage, oil massage, lotion massage, oily lotion massage, and swedish oily lotion thai massage... they have 1 hr massages, 1.5 hr massages, 2 hour massages, and even all day or night massages, they have bulk rooms and private rooms, and mainy will come to your room (house, hotel, office, etc. and then there are the "special"massages but that is a different conversation, just in case Sister Mary Sponsa, Sister Mary Robertine or any of the other Sister Mary's that played a prominent role in my child rearing years are following my blog.
But here's the best part... the price. now i know often quality is way better than quantity but the best is quality and quantity which is what they have going on over here. 1 hour massages can range from $6-$15, a two hour massage from $15-$30, and a four hand (that's two girls for the non-math majors in the group... for an 8 hour massage that has two meals served and a friendly pillow fight for 17000 baht or about $50 dollars...
seem to good to be true... yeah that's what i thought, but day after day, night after night, i just couldn't help treating myself... at first i gave myself reasons... "oh you walked so much today, or you just had a really long flight and this will help you adjust," but within 3 days i didn't even need a reason as it was completely a part of my routine... get up, brush teeth, get a massage... go for a walk to another massage place, have breakfast... relax while food is digesting with a foot massage... go see a temple... reflect on what i saw with a jasmine aroma oil massage... and so the day would go...
and that's the rub (yes pun intended)... they've got it down to a science... lure us in with there huge menu and no obligation try, try, one time attitude and within an hour your hooked... it's worse than crack cocain... i couldn't quit now if i tried...
i literally started this post 2 hours ago, but about 45 minutes in started shaking from withdrawal, ran to get an amazing $7 full hour Cambodian-Thai oil massage (don't ask) and now i'm back...however i was a little worried that i might not make it to the end without another hit...so i brought a couple of them with me... and as i finish this, one is kneading my feet and the other is gently massaging my shoulders...
now that's a happy ending : )
j
you are what you eat...
now we've all heard that before but have we really thought about it... i mean i've said it so many times, that like any other cliche' that has become so common place that it has not only lost the truth it originally held but really almost any meaning all together it could be easily exchanged with... wa, wa, wah, wah, wah... wa, wah wa wah wah...
but when we actually think about it there just might be something there. Health professionals are continually urging us to please eat more consciously. Even the FDA has finally made an official statement, and i'm only slightly paraphrasing here. "Please know that it is totally retarded to think that eating a diet of sugar water (aka soda) preservative and processed rich food alternatives (aka, anything not found on the outer ailes of your super market), and fast food (not even really a food group, more of a "fat"group) isn't having a direct impact to your declining standards of health and overall quality of life"...
and still we relish our ability to be in denial... seeing daily headlines like
"John Doe suffered a fatal heart attack today, he was only 57" .... and inside we are like..."you can't honestly expect me to believe that it had anything to do with his diet. Okay, sure he was 75 pounds over weight and hadn't given his body the proper amount of daily nutrition since his mother stopped breast feeding... but c'mon, really... i just don't see it..."
now what does this have to do with my travels...nothing! but i was trying to get a sponsorship from frito lays or hubba bubba like that Matt guy that dances all over the world and they are passing on me being there international spokesperson... so I'm going on my soap box... (exposing them for what they really are... and to think I could have been bought off so easily... well now they have another frickin Michael Moore on their hands... big mistake... huge!
alright, actually there's more to it than that. I'm in Angor Wat, Cambodia which i could try to describe to you where it is on a map... but really, maps are so last century... just plug it into your GPS or... it's the place where they shot all the cool scenes from Indiana Jones and Tomb Raider.
Okay... so one of the similarities i have been reminded of in all ancient cultures, this one being no expection, is that animal totems have always played an important role in the royal families and high priest/spiritual leader roles... symbols of animals are used to represent or evoke certain qualities that those animals exude. many are the examples of tribal leaders having ceremonial bear claws for power, eagle feathers for regalness and ability to see the grand vision, lions furs for royal respect, the rattle of a snake for protection, and on and on it goes...
and many of these ancient societies would also have ceremonies in which the higher ups from the village would eat the meat and drink the blood of these and other animals with the same intention of ingesting the very essence that these animals and becoming more of that quality themselves and in Angkor Wat that involved drinking the blood of the King Cobra (symbolizing special power, invincibility and majesty... once reserved for kings and spiritual leaders who had dedicated their entire lives to studying the sacred texts, can now be enjoyed by every overweight, outspoken, "Beer: it's not just for breakfast anymore"t-shirt wearing foreigner with $50 to spare... but back to the point...
this type of ceremony is can also be seen in most christian traditions where part of the service involves eating bread and drinking wine, representing the body and blood of Jesus Christ. the hope again being that we become what we eat... literally.
so, is this true?... i don't know but the consistency and pervasiveness of its practice throughout history is at least worthy of serious consideration... and for the sake of appeasing myself, i'm going to ask you to look at it with me for a minute... but first a couple questions...
hint...the following answers are all animals or animal references
1. what do you call someone when you are teasing them because they are afraid to do something?
or sometimes we just make the animal sound to make our point... "balk, balk balk, balk, balk"
2. what kind of mentality do we say someone has when they won't think for themselves, and just do what everyone else does... a la... "you should break away from the ____?... or you should really stop following the ____?
3. what do we call someone who is lazy, fat, overeats, or is a jerk to women... "don't be such a ___?"
for answers please go to p. 376
just kidding
1. chicken
2. herd (as in cattle)
3. pig
top three things Americans eat
1. chicken (animal that most represents fear)
2. beef (animal that doesn't think for itself and does whatever the rest of the group is doing no matter what)
3. pig (pork) the animal that is one of the worst insults we can give someone so a whole slew of calamities
now maybe it's just a coincendence that our society is experiencing dramatic levels of fear, sloth, obesity, and lethargy... you make the call...
food for thought
j
now i gotta run, there's this great place around the corner that serves breakfast all day and i'm totally jonesin for some bacon and eggs, a double side of sausage... and maybe a cold cobra blood smoothie to wash it down : )
but when we actually think about it there just might be something there. Health professionals are continually urging us to please eat more consciously. Even the FDA has finally made an official statement, and i'm only slightly paraphrasing here. "Please know that it is totally retarded to think that eating a diet of sugar water (aka soda) preservative and processed rich food alternatives (aka, anything not found on the outer ailes of your super market), and fast food (not even really a food group, more of a "fat"group) isn't having a direct impact to your declining standards of health and overall quality of life"...
and still we relish our ability to be in denial... seeing daily headlines like
"John Doe suffered a fatal heart attack today, he was only 57" .... and inside we are like..."you can't honestly expect me to believe that it had anything to do with his diet. Okay, sure he was 75 pounds over weight and hadn't given his body the proper amount of daily nutrition since his mother stopped breast feeding... but c'mon, really... i just don't see it..."
now what does this have to do with my travels...nothing! but i was trying to get a sponsorship from frito lays or hubba bubba like that Matt guy that dances all over the world and they are passing on me being there international spokesperson... so I'm going on my soap box... (exposing them for what they really are... and to think I could have been bought off so easily... well now they have another frickin Michael Moore on their hands... big mistake... huge!
alright, actually there's more to it than that. I'm in Angor Wat, Cambodia which i could try to describe to you where it is on a map... but really, maps are so last century... just plug it into your GPS or... it's the place where they shot all the cool scenes from Indiana Jones and Tomb Raider.
Okay... so one of the similarities i have been reminded of in all ancient cultures, this one being no expection, is that animal totems have always played an important role in the royal families and high priest/spiritual leader roles... symbols of animals are used to represent or evoke certain qualities that those animals exude. many are the examples of tribal leaders having ceremonial bear claws for power, eagle feathers for regalness and ability to see the grand vision, lions furs for royal respect, the rattle of a snake for protection, and on and on it goes...
and many of these ancient societies would also have ceremonies in which the higher ups from the village would eat the meat and drink the blood of these and other animals with the same intention of ingesting the very essence that these animals and becoming more of that quality themselves and in Angkor Wat that involved drinking the blood of the King Cobra (symbolizing special power, invincibility and majesty... once reserved for kings and spiritual leaders who had dedicated their entire lives to studying the sacred texts, can now be enjoyed by every overweight, outspoken, "Beer: it's not just for breakfast anymore"t-shirt wearing foreigner with $50 to spare... but back to the point...
this type of ceremony is can also be seen in most christian traditions where part of the service involves eating bread and drinking wine, representing the body and blood of Jesus Christ. the hope again being that we become what we eat... literally.
so, is this true?... i don't know but the consistency and pervasiveness of its practice throughout history is at least worthy of serious consideration... and for the sake of appeasing myself, i'm going to ask you to look at it with me for a minute... but first a couple questions...
hint...the following answers are all animals or animal references
1. what do you call someone when you are teasing them because they are afraid to do something?
or sometimes we just make the animal sound to make our point... "balk, balk balk, balk, balk"
2. what kind of mentality do we say someone has when they won't think for themselves, and just do what everyone else does... a la... "you should break away from the ____?... or you should really stop following the ____?
3. what do we call someone who is lazy, fat, overeats, or is a jerk to women... "don't be such a ___?"
for answers please go to p. 376
just kidding
1. chicken
2. herd (as in cattle)
3. pig
top three things Americans eat
1. chicken (animal that most represents fear)
2. beef (animal that doesn't think for itself and does whatever the rest of the group is doing no matter what)
3. pig (pork) the animal that is one of the worst insults we can give someone so a whole slew of calamities
now maybe it's just a coincendence that our society is experiencing dramatic levels of fear, sloth, obesity, and lethargy... you make the call...
food for thought
j
now i gotta run, there's this great place around the corner that serves breakfast all day and i'm totally jonesin for some bacon and eggs, a double side of sausage... and maybe a cold cobra blood smoothie to wash it down : )
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
the way to enlightenment
fresh off of 6 days of silence and well... i have a lot to say! I spent the last week under the auspices of Venerable Nyanadarsi, a high ranking Malaysian monk who is a master of Vipassana meditation...
now, for the uninitiated i will try as I go to break down this time-honored path to enlightenment in terms that the average lay person can understand... isn't that what all enlightened masters have the task of doing... now, I'm getting ahead of myself, you will need to be the judge of how far along the path i've come in the last week...
so let's get started... first Vipassana as far as I can deduce means "time out" in Sanskrit. remember "time outs" when you got in trouble as a kid... you had to go sit in the corner, you couldn't do anything, you just had to sit there... maybe if your mom was feeling a little compassion she would let you pace back and forth but you could not for any reason leave that area until whatever time limit (based on the severity of your infraction) was sentenced...
well that's a lot like how I spent the last 6 days... it seems that the Buddha felt that human kind wasn't getting it so he put his disciples in a permanent "time out" and their disciples passed it on all the way down the line, till we get unsuspecting eager for an authentic "Buddhist" experience foreigners actually paying to participate and try to learn the art of being in a "time out."
now, a little shout out to my mom here because well I turned out to be a relative natural... you see, I was the only white person and again everyone was extremely polite on the outside but i know they were wondering how long this yankee would last... we Americans with our hedonistic ways and lack of spiritual discipline... well they had no idea how much trouble i got into as a kid... it may have been my first Vipassana retreat but it certainly wasn't this cowboys first time to the "time out" rodeo if you know what i mean...
now, there were a couple of things that i didn't quite understand... again the ultimate purpose of Vipassana Meditation is enlightenment... and who doesn't want that? but there are a couple of inhibiting things that I think explain why only 1 person every few thousand years actually attains it...
1. you have to get up at 0400 (and yes Jon and Jason, that is in the morning) to start looking for it...
and 2. after sitting until you have no feeling in your legs and your back feels like a mad scientist has stuck you with razor sharp pins in every pain center you have and just left them all there, you have to walk in a straight line back and forth, back and forth, eyes low, and here's the key... as slowly as possible for hours on end... i'm talking mega slow motion slow. i guess the idea is that is you are really quite and you go really slow, you just might be able to sneak up on "enlightenment." However, i feel that they have greatly underestimated the sneakiness (Jon that's for you) of enlightenment itself... because even though i was quite, enlightenment probably saw me coming from a mile away and had all day to move out of my way...
but that didn't spoil my spirits, i found that i had other things to worry about... like the other rules... no talking, okay hard but i can do it... up at just after 4am, again seemed like i was still getting up at the end of yesterday but i could hang... however we only had 2 meals a day one at 6:30am and the other at 10:30 am.... that means a lot of time with no food... now i don't eat a lot but i eat fairly often, and for those of you close to me... you know that i am a true case of jeckel and hide when it comes to having not eaten for too long a period of time... now I was determined to do my best but i had flash visions of me losing it at about 8:30pm and before I knew it i was stealing the venerable's robe and using it to scale down the side of the 4 story building we were sequestered in and hoofing it to the nearest 7-11 for a big packet of the latest in hostess goodies.
some of the other rules...
1. no killing any living beings (did pretty good, but the first night some ants found their way to some crumbs on my plate and before i could stop myself I sent them to an early next life)
2. no eating at incorrect times... (i have to admit, for the sake of everyone there but mostly mine, i snuck packets of crackers from the afternoon tea table back to my room just in case... and on more than one occasion... well at least the venerable still has his robe)
3. no inappropriate sexual pleasures... since when is masterbating inappropriate... and besides 6 days... come on we are still human aren't we... (that one seemed more like a "try your best but we totally understand" than an actual rule)
4. no singing, or dancing.... (i would have made it on this one, but literally the last night just before going to bed, realizing i was going to make it, i broke out into a personal version of We are the champions, in the singular... and did a little jig... seemed more like the spirit took over, that can't be my fault)
5. and last but not least... no lying (again you would think in a silent retreat this would be easy, and it was but after the closing we had one group meal and we were allowed to talk... almost no-one spoke english but with much effort one of the guys asked me a very labored "did you come all way America for Vipassana retreat?" and i'm sorry but it just seemed like the right, and by right i mean "easiest," thing to do, to say yes... i'm just not sure that I wouldn't still be there if i told him that actually i had no idea i would be doing this and if it hadn't been for about 443 things falling into place there's no way it would have happened... you see first there was... (you can see my dilema and i'm sure you would agree i took the high road)
so am i enlightened?... i don't know.... what I do know is that as enticing as the idea of "enlightenmkent" is, it's a relatively tough sell. it's not the enormous odds that we are up against... people love the idea of possibly beating insurmountable odds, that's the whole basis of the lottery... but the difference is, every once and a while people do actually win the lottery. And when we can see billy bob from somewhere in the outback of okalahoma with his missing teeth, overalls that he's been wearing since he was 12 and 8-10 kids all under the age of 5 holding an oversized check in the amount of $72 gazillion dollars, we say to ourselves, hell if he can win maybe i can too and it's off the the nearest convenience store to roll the dice one more time...
but when's the last time you actually saw an enlightened being... i know we have pictures and shrines to the most famous ones but really since JC (jesus Christ) who is on that list? Now i'm not saying that there aren't any, i personally believe that there are more than ever before... it's just that something about self-realized beings, they just don't seem to want the publicity, chosing to live simple lives in caves or in remote villages in India or Brazil... but either way, to the untrained eye, the outer picture doesn't necessarily leave an unquenchable desire for the lay person to throw there life savings (lottery reference) at their shot at the title.
so here's my suggestion... sell enlightenment as the by product of getting an amazing set of abs. I mean sitting still is an amazing core workout and only eating two small meals a day, there is no way to not tighten up... and in this regard... well... I'm a believer.... just look at what it did for me.
and yes that's me (kim, the path to enlightenment is always top lit)
so i may not be enlightened but Vipassana has me looking ABSolutely fantastic!
namaste my friends,
swami j
now, for the uninitiated i will try as I go to break down this time-honored path to enlightenment in terms that the average lay person can understand... isn't that what all enlightened masters have the task of doing... now, I'm getting ahead of myself, you will need to be the judge of how far along the path i've come in the last week...
so let's get started... first Vipassana as far as I can deduce means "time out" in Sanskrit. remember "time outs" when you got in trouble as a kid... you had to go sit in the corner, you couldn't do anything, you just had to sit there... maybe if your mom was feeling a little compassion she would let you pace back and forth but you could not for any reason leave that area until whatever time limit (based on the severity of your infraction) was sentenced...
well that's a lot like how I spent the last 6 days... it seems that the Buddha felt that human kind wasn't getting it so he put his disciples in a permanent "time out" and their disciples passed it on all the way down the line, till we get unsuspecting eager for an authentic "Buddhist" experience foreigners actually paying to participate and try to learn the art of being in a "time out."
now, a little shout out to my mom here because well I turned out to be a relative natural... you see, I was the only white person and again everyone was extremely polite on the outside but i know they were wondering how long this yankee would last... we Americans with our hedonistic ways and lack of spiritual discipline... well they had no idea how much trouble i got into as a kid... it may have been my first Vipassana retreat but it certainly wasn't this cowboys first time to the "time out" rodeo if you know what i mean...
now, there were a couple of things that i didn't quite understand... again the ultimate purpose of Vipassana Meditation is enlightenment... and who doesn't want that? but there are a couple of inhibiting things that I think explain why only 1 person every few thousand years actually attains it...
1. you have to get up at 0400 (and yes Jon and Jason, that is in the morning) to start looking for it...
and 2. after sitting until you have no feeling in your legs and your back feels like a mad scientist has stuck you with razor sharp pins in every pain center you have and just left them all there, you have to walk in a straight line back and forth, back and forth, eyes low, and here's the key... as slowly as possible for hours on end... i'm talking mega slow motion slow. i guess the idea is that is you are really quite and you go really slow, you just might be able to sneak up on "enlightenment." However, i feel that they have greatly underestimated the sneakiness (Jon that's for you) of enlightenment itself... because even though i was quite, enlightenment probably saw me coming from a mile away and had all day to move out of my way...
but that didn't spoil my spirits, i found that i had other things to worry about... like the other rules... no talking, okay hard but i can do it... up at just after 4am, again seemed like i was still getting up at the end of yesterday but i could hang... however we only had 2 meals a day one at 6:30am and the other at 10:30 am.... that means a lot of time with no food... now i don't eat a lot but i eat fairly often, and for those of you close to me... you know that i am a true case of jeckel and hide when it comes to having not eaten for too long a period of time... now I was determined to do my best but i had flash visions of me losing it at about 8:30pm and before I knew it i was stealing the venerable's robe and using it to scale down the side of the 4 story building we were sequestered in and hoofing it to the nearest 7-11 for a big packet of the latest in hostess goodies.
some of the other rules...
1. no killing any living beings (did pretty good, but the first night some ants found their way to some crumbs on my plate and before i could stop myself I sent them to an early next life)
2. no eating at incorrect times... (i have to admit, for the sake of everyone there but mostly mine, i snuck packets of crackers from the afternoon tea table back to my room just in case... and on more than one occasion... well at least the venerable still has his robe)
3. no inappropriate sexual pleasures... since when is masterbating inappropriate... and besides 6 days... come on we are still human aren't we... (that one seemed more like a "try your best but we totally understand" than an actual rule)
4. no singing, or dancing.... (i would have made it on this one, but literally the last night just before going to bed, realizing i was going to make it, i broke out into a personal version of We are the champions, in the singular... and did a little jig... seemed more like the spirit took over, that can't be my fault)
5. and last but not least... no lying (again you would think in a silent retreat this would be easy, and it was but after the closing we had one group meal and we were allowed to talk... almost no-one spoke english but with much effort one of the guys asked me a very labored "did you come all way America for Vipassana retreat?" and i'm sorry but it just seemed like the right, and by right i mean "easiest," thing to do, to say yes... i'm just not sure that I wouldn't still be there if i told him that actually i had no idea i would be doing this and if it hadn't been for about 443 things falling into place there's no way it would have happened... you see first there was... (you can see my dilema and i'm sure you would agree i took the high road)
so am i enlightened?... i don't know.... what I do know is that as enticing as the idea of "enlightenmkent" is, it's a relatively tough sell. it's not the enormous odds that we are up against... people love the idea of possibly beating insurmountable odds, that's the whole basis of the lottery... but the difference is, every once and a while people do actually win the lottery. And when we can see billy bob from somewhere in the outback of okalahoma with his missing teeth, overalls that he's been wearing since he was 12 and 8-10 kids all under the age of 5 holding an oversized check in the amount of $72 gazillion dollars, we say to ourselves, hell if he can win maybe i can too and it's off the the nearest convenience store to roll the dice one more time...
but when's the last time you actually saw an enlightened being... i know we have pictures and shrines to the most famous ones but really since JC (jesus Christ) who is on that list? Now i'm not saying that there aren't any, i personally believe that there are more than ever before... it's just that something about self-realized beings, they just don't seem to want the publicity, chosing to live simple lives in caves or in remote villages in India or Brazil... but either way, to the untrained eye, the outer picture doesn't necessarily leave an unquenchable desire for the lay person to throw there life savings (lottery reference) at their shot at the title.
so here's my suggestion... sell enlightenment as the by product of getting an amazing set of abs. I mean sitting still is an amazing core workout and only eating two small meals a day, there is no way to not tighten up... and in this regard... well... I'm a believer.... just look at what it did for me.
and yes that's me (kim, the path to enlightenment is always top lit)
so i may not be enlightened but Vipassana has me looking ABSolutely fantastic!
namaste my friends,
swami j
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