Head above the parapet

No need for alarm. Got whacked out what with one thing and another. Head now back above the parapet.

9/11 in a Movie-Made World

We knew it was coming. Not, as conspiracy theorists imagine, just a few top officials among us, but all of us -- and not for weeks or months, but for more than half a century before September 11, 2001.

By Tom Engelhardt: TomDispatch

Roy's people

Roy's people? That's Roy Orbison, he of the dark shades, thick mane of hair, and Only the Lonely, Runnin' Scared, In Dreams. His people?

The Shenandoah is not a bar. It's not a tavern. It's a beer joint. The kind that does cash-only business and scratches hard for every nickel it turns. And lately, it is about the only place in my life slowed down and dumbed down enough to honestly relax. It takes a couple of hours. Nearly everyone here on this Sunday morning lives or grew up within blocks of the place and feels most at home here -- which is not unlike myself, who used to sell newspapers on the corner here at age 12 and who, if the light is right, can imagine that pale, scruffy youngster shouting Paaaaaapers! NoozPaaaaaapers! Such nostalgia eases the frustrated wildness in old men.

By the terrific Joe Bageant: counterpunch

When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts

Something for the weekend? Acts I and II of Spike Lee's documentary When the Levee Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts covers the before, during and after of hurricane Katrina; the subsequent collapse of New Orleans' levee system; and the terrible flooding and devastation of the city. Some of the newsreel clips will be familiar to anyone who followed those events on TV or online. To view youtube installements of Acts I and II, please go via Lenin's Tomb

During an American TV donation telethon five days after the hurricane, rapper Kanye West abandoned what was rolling down his teleprompter and gave a somewhat disjointed but passionate speech that ended: "George Bush don't care about black people."

Kanye West telling it like it is, next to a puppet named Mike Myers (who's he?): youtube

Not just black people, Kanye. Not as evidenced in Acts III and IV, which have some truly jaw-dropping moments documenting the year since and what has happened in New Orleans. And what hasn't happened. A sample: youtube
To view all the youtubes for Acts III and IV, please go via Lenin's Tomb

Hong Kong: Latin dance finale

Cha cha ching! The plaintiff, HSBC Private Bank Asia Regional Chief Executive Officer Monica Wong, 61, and the defendants, Latin Dance teachers Mirko Saccani, 31, and his wife, Gaynor Fairweather, 49, appeared before Hong Kong's High Court in mid-June.



Now the High Court has finallly spoken: the defendants to repay the plaintiff the money she paid upfront in 2004: HK$62,000,000. That, plus interest.

Whether the defendants still have the money is not clear. Full report: Hong Kong Standard

New view of a little island in the South China Sea

Google Map has updated the satellite image of a little island in the South China Sea. Zoom in and, among other things, you can now see the swimming pontoons and shark prevention nets on Tung Wan and Kwun Yam beaches. (Oh, that circular thing between the two beaches is the heli-pad for the air ambulance). Awesome!

The image is awesome, that is, not the shark prevention nets. The shark nets are completely unnecessary. They were installed because along the inshore eastern waters of Hong Kong a shark (or sharks), some years ago, took to grabbing the occasional early morning Chinese takeaway.

As there would have been an outcry (putting the public at risk!) if the nets were not installed at all public beaches, the nets were therefore installed everywhere. Nevermind that at swimming bays on the western side of Hong Kong no shark had ever been seen, let alone registered as causing any fatality.

Why the occurence of sharks in the clear eastern waters but their absence in the soupy waters of the west? As far as I can tell, sharks value their health, and the health of their offspring, and would not swim in waters which were thick with the particulates gushing out of the nearby Pearl River estuary. Sigh. . .

Google Map

The Guardian: now you see it, now you don't

Monday, The Guardian carried an op-ed by Shimon Peres, Israel's deputy prime minister. Based on the first paragraph, the deputy prime minister needs to promptly see his doctor so as to change his medication.

For reason's best known to itself, The Guardian placed the Peres op-ed in the Comment is Free section. And comments there were, plenty of comments. More than two hundred and fifty, until The Guardian closed and 'disappeared' the Peres op-ed and the comments it generated from CIF as well as from the Most Active table.

Perhaps the disappearance had to do with phone calls from an angry Israeli Embassy? Who knows.

For the time being, however, Peres + Comments is still accessible, if you dig around: CIF

Sleazy, Humiliated, Despised

Ross McKibbin on New Labour’s terminal decline: London Review of Books

Attack of the killer ray

Current management principles for stingray injuries: NSW Sea Kayak Club

Step this way, please

Ten spectacular sporting entrances: Observer/Guardian
Thanks, Mick S!

Where’s Mao? Chinese revise history books

Mao's almost out. . . a lot of other changes too, many of them fresh and surprising (registration-free link): NYT

In praise of the pomegranate

This weekend on a little island in the South China Sea, Mister B's fruit and veg lady is selling pomegranates. Retail? HK$8.00.

They come, so I am told, from Guangdong province.

A quick search online reveals, however, that the 'best' pomegranates in China come from Shandong province.

Shandong, you will recall, is the home of Tsingtao Beer -- a beverage first brewed in 1903 by some thirsty Germans in the city of the same name in what was then a German concession. Pomegranates, on the other hand, originated in the country formerly known as Persia.

Be all that as it may, Mister B's relatively locally-grown pomegranate is very good, although a little sharp (like grapefruit). It also has lots of antioxidant whatnot and other healthy properties: wikipedia

Other facts unearthed thanks to an online search: (a) the city of Granada in Andalusia, Spain, derives its name from the Moorish word for the pomegranate, gárnata; (b) likewise the hand grenade because it looks like one.

Plus, the pomegranate has all sorts of sacred meanings, medicinal, and heraldic uses, according to the British Medical Association Journal (scroll down): bmj

Not bad for eight dollars Hong Kong, eh?

When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts

Must-see.
Spike Lee documentary.
Acts I and II.
(In youtube installments, who knows how long they will be up)
via Lenin's Tomb

20th-century music: 25 reasons to reconsider

Tim Page offers 25 recordings of classical music of the 20th century: Washington Post
via aworks

Food politics, the omnivore's dilemma

Once upon a time, so long ago, Mister B sauntered into a supermarket in Crouch End, London. So far, so good. But then he crashed to a halt. It was an arresting experience: one of the supermarket's shelves had a long row of blue tins that were, verily, rhythmically pulsing a day-glo bright blue colour.

Perhaps that had something to do with the hallucinogenic he had ingested an hour or two earlier.

But those eight-ounce tins of Heinz Baked Beans. . . identical, innumerable. . . temporarily neon-light bright. . . where did they come from? And inside the tins, what kind of beans were they? Where did they, you know, grow?

Thus began an alchemical quest to discover the true nature of things. It lasted a couple of weeks, until another distraction interfered. That might have been psilocybin or a girl named Lesley. Or, psilocybin and Lesley. Who knows? It's a long time ago. Anyway, it was only later, much later, that the truth about baked beans became known: baked beans

Elsewhere, a cornucopia of new books tells us where our food comes from. By Tom Philpott, good read: grist

Bob Dylan: Modern Times

Postman Pat came through this lunchtime with the package: Bob Dylan, Modern Times. So. . . how is it? Based on several listens, it's much, much better than "Love & Theft". Modern Times has a lot stronger set of songs and musical arrangements to match. In a word: TheLevee'sGonnaBreak.

Elsewhere, Bob on Bob, Dylan talks -- by the worthwhile Louis Menand: The New Yorker
Free bonus, The Crackin’, Shakin’, Breakin’ Sounds, profile of Dylan (1964) -- by Nat Hentoff: The New Yorker

The world's shortest Bob Dylan interview: creem magazine

Hong Kong: Star Ferry loses its brilliance

Hong Kong's English-language daily newspapers -- South China Morning Post, The Standard -- today feature what will become (in November) Hongkongside's new Star Ferry terminal. Front page stuff, something to do with completion of the external features of the new terminal: The Standard

The workaday Star Ferry terminal (Hongkongside) has been in its current spot for more than fifty years. Within spitting distance of Central, the public area this side of the terminal's turnstyles was the place for strangers to meet, acquaintances to become friends, and where lovers' hearts were made and broken. A super convenient way to get to Kowloon from Central, a journey on the Star Ferry offered we the hurried masses a pleasant pause, a cool breeze, and what once passed for fresh air.











(click on image to enlarge)
No more. Locals, be they commuters or otherwise, will abandon the Star Ferry in their droves. Why? The new ferry terminal is a good ten-minute walk from Central and half way across the harbour. For those who take the trouble to take the ferry, it only gets worse: the planners are closing the bus station outside Star Ferry Kowloonside. What was once a transport hub will be no more. Go figure. Expect to see Star Ferry's numbers plummet and current usage -- locals (70%) and tourists (30%) -- reverse within a short time of opening. Such is the way of progress.

Meanwhile, the old ferry terminal is to be "reclaimed" -- that is, the site is going to be filled in all the way along to the Hong Kong Convention Centre in Wanchai. What for, you might ask. To enable the construction of yet another highway. As for Hong Kong's once magnificent harbour, it shrinks by the month and is destined to become a narrow drain.












Yes, they paved paradise and put up a parking lot. . .

Reading matters

From the archives, Michael Korda on Graham Greene: The New Yorker

Whistleblower? Youtube it

Lockheed Martin worker takes concerns to Youtube and becomes ex-Lockheed Martin worker: Washington Post

Blowin' the whistle: youtube

Martin Luther King, Jr: I Have a Dream

This day in 1963 Martin Luther King spoke thus in Washington DC: