Moving 
I've gotten tired of the banner at the top of the page. I've also decided to bite the bullet and use movable type for this blog. Please change your links to this:

http://www.226-design.com/grey/

and this is the last time I'll move the address. I promise. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 11:54 AM |

Reggae in the snow 
It's cold out. I'm listening to reggae to warm up. In college, I met a girl who thinks of Christmas when she hears Bob Marley. During winter break, she worked at a place that made fruit baskets. The other employees were from the Carribean and they would play reggae throughout the season. She told this to us towards the end of the summer. The windows were open and I was cycling through a number of reggae records. We had all just returned from vacation and were wondering what to do about dinner. Midway through "No Woman No Cry" she said the song reminded her of Christmas. And then she told us the story. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 5:03 PM |

Opera 
I once saw Luciano Pavarotti emerge from a limousine. I was walking home from Lincoln Center. I had gone to Tower Records and spent more money than I should have on opera cds. While browsing their selections, I had determined to buy a recording by Cecilia Bartoli of French chansons, but was debating whether to spend the money on an entire Verdi opera with Maria Callas singing the title role. It was my first year in the city; I was poor. I had attended the opera a few times, always standing in the cheapest section at the back of the room. Occasionally, a patron called away after the first act would offer his or her orchestra ticket to us. The ushers were adamant that we not sneak into any empty seat otherwise.

At one performance I met a clarinetest who studied at Juilliard. She was working that day as an usher. She said she was once given front row tickets to an opera at the Met. She said listening to the singer's diction at such close range was something she would never forget. Then she apologized for not allowing me to claim an empty seat in the house. The ushers would actually contain the standing room area with a velvet rope at the beginning of each act.

That afternoon at Tower I kept picking up the CDs and putting it back. I would circle the aisles flipping through various albums, return, pick up the CDs, and put them back. Finally I decided to use my credit card and buy them both. I walked home to save subway fare, although that was a minor expense compared to the cost of the CDs. I walked south along Broadway until I came to Fifty-ninth Street, then turned left to walk along the southern boundary of the Park. A limousine was parked in front of the Essex House. I was still relatively new to New York and so I slowed my step to see who might emerge. As I passed I looked in, but couldn't see. Glancing back, I watched as a large man slowly made his way out of the car. I turned and saw Pavarotti, beaming at the manager of the hotel. I smiled and held my CDs close. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 12:10 AM |

Look left look right. Look right look left. 
This morning I caught myself looking right before left when crossing West Broadway. Growing up in America, I was taught to look left, then right, then left again. In New York, the majority of the streets are one-way, and so I look in only one direction depending on whether the street is an even or odd number. I began looking to the right first after my trip to Southeast Asia. While each country drives on a different side of the road, I spent the majority of my time in Thailand, where people drive on the left. I'm not sure why. In Myanmar, people drove on the left until 1970, when Ne Win decreed that traffic would drive on the right. It is said that a fortune-teller told him he would die in a traffic accident on the left side of the road. And so, on a morning in 1970, all traffic stopped, then slowly switched lanes. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 10:36 AM |

Better Off Dead 
Although I grew up in the 80s, I didn't see the films of that decade until later. Long Duck Dong was as unfamiliar to me as Lloyd Dobler until after college, when I decided to rent the movies my friends quoted and referenced throughout high school. Last night I rented Better Off Dead. To a certain extent, I've grown up with John Cusak. In Better Off Dead, he's the awkward teenager who needs the French foreign exchange student to teach him to take a stand. By Say Anything, he's turned himself into the coolest kid in school. And then in Grosse Point Blank, he attends his high school reunion, just about the time I attended mine.

I was reluctant to attend our reunion. Patty talked me into attending, and she forced the issue as I circled the empty parking lot at the Groton Motor Inn looking for a spot. "Just park already!" Two cars pulled in on either side of us, and out stepped friends I had all but forgotten. Revelations continued through the night, whispered amongst friends ("She's a stripper!"), or shouted in semi-drunk stupors over the din of music and dancing ("I'm sorry for how I treated you, dude! I always admired you!"). It seemed everyone danced with everyone. From the mini-reunion in the parking lot to the gathering afterwards at Don's house, it was a love-fest. Returning to New York, Joanne and I met Lauren for brunch. Lauren was unable to attend the reunion and wanted to hear how it was. We sat and as she asked us questions, Joanne remarked, "I have to rely on what E says; I had to get drunk to go, and now I can't remember a thing." 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 9:35 AM |

Snowbound buses 
I walked past a Big Apple Tour bus this morning stuck on the corner of Spring and Wooster. While negotiating the corner, the wheels became encased in snow. A few tourists looked out from within at a small lot usually filled with clothes and jewelry vendors. The driver and tour guide walked around the bus with shovels. A few years ago, I was stuck on a city bus during a blizzard. The bus slowly slid to a stop, and when the driver tried to pull away from the curb, the wheels spun on a patch of ice. He tried rocking the bus unsuccessfully. He shrugged and announced, "This bus is now out of service," then opened the doors. A passing bus picked us up. I didn't think the story was that interesting, but apparently readers love a weather story. It made the papers. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 1:06 PM |

Dream house 
I've been dreaming of the same house for the past few nights. I always see it from the same angle, emerging from between two hills, a tree to the right, and a shed at the back. On the shed are painted the letters "LCD." While the physical house is the same from dream to dream, its purpose is different. There are different occupants, and I am coming up to the house for different reasons. I can never remember what those motivations are when I wake, just that they are different from dream to dream. I have never been inside. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 9:37 AM |

New York snowfall 
I walked out in the snow this evening to buy a pint of ice cream. Flakes brushed my umbrella; snow crunched underfoot. Snow fell my first night in New York. I had come from Boston to interview for a job at St. Martin's Press. Afterwards, I called a college friend I knew to be in the city. We met for lunch, and he mentioned Henry Threadgill had a gig that night at the Knitting Factory. He offered his couch, and I decided to stay the night. We walked out of the concert into a blizzard. Traffic had all but stopped and people were skiing in the street. Snow covered our shoulders in seconds. The flakes were large and fell fast. We walked from the club to the east village, slipping on the drifts that had already piled up along the sidewalks. We stepped into a cafe for coffee and sambuca and to watch the snow fall. The windows were fogged over, giving the outside world a dreamy quality. A small jazz band played in the corner. A clarinetist soloed. Everything seemed subdued, as if all the city had paused to gaze at the snow quickly blanketing the concrete. I met my friend's girlfriend that night. He had thought to marry her. Years later, he married my cousin. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 12:14 AM |

Rice Balls 
There's a place on 45th street between Lexington and Third called oms/b which serves rice balls. There's another café on Mulberry that does the same. I love the place on 45th. It's a small shop and very clean. Upon entering you can smell the cooked rice. I've only recently started eating rice balls. Simmy and I discovered the place on 45th a few months ago, and now, on my lunch trips uptown, I tend to favor it.

Rice balls remind me of Hirokazu Koreeda's After Life, a film about memory and the making of films. In one scene, a grandmother is remembering her childhood, before the war. She remembers sitting in a bamboo grove, making rice balls with her mother. She teaches the actors around her how to make them, showing them the proper size and technique, much as her mother must have done. The last time I sat in a bamboo forest was in Kamakura, Japan, at the Hokokuji Temple. For a small fee you could be served macha in a wooden bowl. It was late November, just after Thanksgiving, and I sat with the bowl warming my hands. On a small tray sat two candies shaped into plum blossoms. The damp air muted perception, but I could hear the murmur of conversation around me and the creaking of wood, and the sound of steps on stone. After I had finished the bitter tea and the candies, I sat until the warmth began to leave me, then gathered my things and rose to leave. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 2:21 PM |

Kampuchea 
A friend of Li-T emailed me yesterday. She had recently returned from Cambodia and is thinking of putting together a website to promote her friend's tour company. Along with her request she sent me a link to her photos. I was in Southeast Asia in 2000 and spent a week at Angkor. It was was one of the best weeks of my life. Looking at her photographs, I remember the intricate beauty of Banteay Srei, the crumbling majesty of Beng Mealea, the perfect symmetry of Angkor Wat. There, I fell in love with Khmer sculpture and architecture. It's hard to pick the hilights. Sitting in the jungle, surrounded by stone, I wrote in my journal, took photographs, and sent postcards to friends, trying to capture some part of the experience. I swam in the Tonlé Sap, negotiated the lingas submerged in the waters of the Kobal Spean, and watched the sunrise atop temples built a thousand years ago. One night Ohl, my motorcycle driver, took me to the West Baray and negotiated with a boatsman to take us to the center of the resevoir. The remains of the West Mebon lay on an island facing the sunset. We sat on blocks warmed by the sun and watched as the light leaked out of the day. Returning to shore, the figure of my driver and boatsman blurred into shadow. The only sound was the light putt putt putt of the outboard motor. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 10:48 AM |

Musique FranÇaise 
In college I saw a production of Jacques Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris. I had no idea who he was. The show was presented as a cabaret, featuring Brel's songs translated into English. Later, I heard Brel himself when a friend played one of his records over brunch, and I heard the same songs rendered in their native tongue. It was the second time I heard "Ne Me Quitte Pas," and that album became the first French language album I purchased. I later heard a disappointing rendition of the song by Sting. In high school I had heard of Edith Piaf (the little sparrow), and was familiar with Fére Jacques, but Brel opened up a new world of popular music. I found my first Edith Piaf record on a sidewalk in New York, stuck in a box of classical records being thrown out by someone moving from one place to another. (On the same sidewalk, I later found a copy of Eric B. and Rakim's Paid in Full, the cover ripped, but the vinyl in good condition). Lately I've discovered Françoise Hardy, and find myself gravitating back towards Serge Gainsbourg. The first Gainsbourg album I owned was given to me. A friend's parents were visiting from France and she asked them to bring me a copy of the two CD compilation À Gainsbarre. I have never before or since heard anyone render the word "black" with such a dark guttural thickness. You can almost hold it like tar in your hand. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 11:36 PM |

E—— 
On Sunday, I gave G prints of some photographs I took at her birthday party. We met at Lin's, who cooked a great New Year's dinner. (One of the more interesting observations made was that Judy Dean wears Aisics, the marathoner's footwear of choice.) As she flipped through the pictures, I stopped her to ask the name of one of her friends. Ah, that's E——, she said. She's the girl I was trying to match you with. We've met twice so far, but I had forgotten that G had designs on our future. I asked if she had reminded me before meeting her. "No," she said. "It's just as well; I guess there have been no sparks." I seem to remember G saying in the past she wasn't sure we'd necessarily hit it off as a couple, just that we'd be funny together. I'm not sure what she meant by that then, and, after meeting her friend, I'm still not sure what she means by that now. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 10:41 PM |

New Order 
I can't stop listening to Power, Corruption, and Lies. Growing up in a Connecticut suburb, I was an alien to the Asian affinity for electronic bands in the 80s. I was introduced to Depeche Mode through Violator, rather than any of the previous albums that lent their hits to 101, and the true power of "Bizarre Love Triangle" (pre-Frente) didn't manifest itself until I visited Taiwan. In high school, I listened to classic rock, publicly eschewing pop, but privately crowding around the radio for the weekly top 40. I never sold out Michael Jackson, however; at least not until Dangerous. Late college is when I was more formally introduced. Until then, Anything Box was an unknown to me as were Yaz and Erasure. In Taipei, I watched as their songs packed the dance floor. Everyone sang the words, mimicked the action, "Every time I see you falling I get down on my knees and pray," "Oh l'amour. Broke my heart now I'm aching for you . . . "

Last year, my cousin Irene danced her first dance to Depeche Mode's "Somebody" at her wedding. Around the room, everyone's lips were moving, everyone was singing along. And so was I. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 10:35 AM |

FÉVE 
I haven't had a galette du roi this year. I don't have one every year, but I think about it. They're only available in January, to celebrate The Feast of the Kings. I was introduced to the cakes four or five years ago by Anaïs. French tradition dictates that whomever finds the prize baked inside is king or queen for the day. In the past the surprise was a fève—a large, flat bean. More recently it has been replaced with a porcelain figurine. I was never certain what rights and privledges being king entitles one, save wearing the paper crown that comes with the cake. In America, if you want to wear a paper crown, you can go to Burger King, year-round. The next year I bought a galette for myself, inviting people to take slices as they visited. I didn't find the fève in the large slice that I took. A friend only wanted a taste. The slice she cut was no wider than a pen. She took a bite, then another, then cried out. From her mouth she pulled a milk maiden.

Guillemette tells me she baked one a few weeks ago for a friend's party. When I told her I hadn't had a galette this year, she said that had she known she would have saved me a piece. It's ok. I'm only looking for the fève. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 11:42 PM |

Prince and Cyndi Lauper 
I'm listening to Cyndi Lauper's first album, She's So Unusual. At dinner on Friday one of the topics of conversation was 80s music. The Lightning Seeds, a band that I had all but forgotten, was mentioned, and after this I'll have to dig out their album, if only to hear "Pure." Cyndi Lauper came up in another 80s conversation yesterday. After "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun," the chords of the next song were oddly familiar. As soon as the synths came in (echoing the guitars of the original) I realized it was Prince's "When You Were Mine." Before Life closed, I saw Prince at the club. The doors opened at 9; the show was advertised as starting at 10. Prince was coming from another uptown gig (for an awards show) and as 10 o'clock approached, there was news of an uptown delay. Eleven came and went, and then midnight. People complained how Prince was notoriously late for club shows, and my feet were starting to ache. Around two in the morning, roadies started arriving and setting up. Prince was in the area, if not in the building. Forty-five minutes to an hour later, a diminutive form was seen walking to the stage. He played for almost three hours. It was amazing. After the show, I walked out of the club to an already brightening sky. I went home, slept for an hour or two, and went to work, his guitar burned into my mind. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 11:13 AM |

Huo Guo 
The other day, I heard someone mention that huo guo is a traditional Chinese New Year meal. I hadn't heard of that before, but found myself at an all-you-can-eat huo guo buffet for dinner. David was meeting a group of friends he met during the Overseas Chinese Youth Language Training and Study Tour to the Republic of China and invited me to join them. I attended the same study tour years before. I was the 3rd oldest male to attend that year, a distinction that brought with it a minor celebrity status. My fondest memory of the six week tour was an afternoon I was to meet a friend for a jazz concert in the courtyard of the Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall. I took a cab and arrived to find the space devoid of musicians, and my friend. I climbed the steps of the opera house to better scan the crowds from its terrace. A Taiwanese student stood beside me, looked at me askance, and then began to talk to me. We spent the afternoon chatting in Chinese, and when the afternoon threatened to become early evening, she led me to the nearest bus stop and directed me the way home. I had never before been so squeezed into a vehicle.

Earlier in my stay, I had asked a cousin of mine if she could tell we were not local Taiwanese. She laughed and told me it was obvious, from the shorts and t-shirts we wore, to the Tevas on our feet. What if we traded outfits with a typical Taiwanese native? I asked. She said it was still obvious. It was in our bearing, our attitude, the way we walked. In my more recent travels through Asia, I have been mistaken for a Chinese mainlander, a Bangkok native, a Myanmar villager, a Japanese teenager in Kyoto. I'm uncertain whether this means the east has become more western, or if I am better able to adapt to my surroundings.

In Myanmar I took to wearing longyi. They were significantly cooler than my pants. It was near Inle lake that I was mistaken. I was returning to my guesthouse after a day touring the area, and night was falling. As I turned in, the owner emerged from her office and paused. She told me she thought I was a local boy walking home until I turned into the driveway and the light caught my glasses. "None of the kids here wear glasses," she told me, then asked what I wanted for dinner. Later that night the power went out. I have never before seen so many stars. 
posted by Shall we dansu @ 2:18 AM |