owT traP, esreveR ni anihC ni serutnevdA

And as the day began, the streets were still littered with the remains of firecrackers, which had gone off incessantly throughout the night and into the early morning. Little red ashes were scattered everywhere; and all about were old men and women, wearing red vests, sweeping up the debris into indiscreet piles at intermittent distances. A smell of lingering smoke hung in the air, which was dry and windy, and very cold.

In my (half-)deafness, I had managed a good sleep, despite at one point being awoken by the chaos of the night's celebrations. You see, it was the Chinese New Year, and what had just passed was the Eve. Unlike back home, laws are not in existence in China to limit how people use fireworks, at least not on this holiday. And the people took full advantage. Randomly, bursts would sound, from afar and from nearby, loud as a shotgun, sometimes right in the middle of the bike paths which framed almost every road throughout Beijing.

When we were all ready, our shoes on, our gloves in our pockets, and our jackets zipped, Loren, Luke and I walked out of the comfort of the hotel, and began to walk down the street. Today's trip would take us to the Forbidden City, which was a conveniently short distance from our lodgings.

The walk led us initially into the beautiful Forbidden Park, where we puzzled over a map and took pictures. Before long we found ourselves staring effusively at the great red walls of the old palatial complex, and at the huge portrait of Mao which overhung its facade. The scope of this structure cannot be overstated: It consists of more than 8,700 rooms, and nearly 1,000 buildings. Its size as an imperial palace is mind-boggling. And today it is a museum, open from 8:30-4:30. Whereas before the penalty of being within its borders without permission meant instant death, today a fee of roughly $10 for a ticket will do the trick.

Our first misfortune, and one of many that would follow that morning, was that, due to the Chinese New Year, the Forbidden City would remain closed, or so we were told. So we wandered around the courtyard just inside the gates, staring wistfully at the towers, and at the fence behind which the massive doors to the Outer Court stood, stolidly closed and glowing in the sunrise that had just eclipsed the outermost walls. Shops distracted us -- or Loren, rather. Luke and I wandered apathetically about in search of a diversion.

Here our second misfortune occurred. We became separated from Loren, amidst the heavy traffic of some thousands of tourists in the courtyard. After a brief search, Luke and I departed the courtyard, and headed back to the hotel. On our way, however, I decided to see Tiananmen Square, but Luke, his knee still in pain from hiking the Great Wall yesterday, decided to go back to the hotel and take a nap (what having slept only a few hours with all that racket in the night).

Throughout this area of Beijing, in addition to the subway stations, there are several underground crosswalks. Tiananmen Square, while untouched by them, is flanked by several on the surrounding streets. After leaving Luke, I made my way down the stairs into the compressed air of the nearest walk, glancing obliquely at every direction in which the tunnel veered: Escalators going down on the left; a wide branch going ahead and to the right; immediately to my right, separated by a partition, another entrance; and ahead, the light of the exit to where I was headed. I smiled at a relaxed guard on my way, and he returned my smile quickly before resuming his placid but expressionless post.

In the air again, I walked, uncertain where to cross to get to the square itself. To the east, immediately to my left, a long building stretched. Later I learned it was the National Museum of China. On the far right, the Great Hall of the People, which functions as the Chinese Parliament, loomed behind the imposing Monument to the People's Heroes, an obelisk with a large base structure that rippled outward in a series of platforms and stairs from the monument.

Eventually, I found a street crosswalk. I realized then, after spotting a tent, that I would be checked before entering the square. But once finally through, a strange thought occurred to me, and was confirmed in a quick reappraisal of my surroundings. Apart from the security checkpoint, the layout of this whole area was not unlike Washington, D.C., where the National Mall unfolds down the road toward the Capitol Building, flanked on all sides by memorials and museums. There's even an obelisk there, too: The Washington Monument. And at the far end, there was the Mausoleum of Mao Zedong, perhaps a little like the Lincoln Memorial.

I was taken in by the location, by whatever history lurked beneath the stones and cement there in the square. Unspoken history, bloody, revolutionary, and celebratory, weighed lightly on my mind. I smiled as I took out my camera and prepared to take a picture of the Monument. But before I could do so, my third misfortune struck.

To be continued in Part Two of Part Two....

enO traP, esreveR ni anihC ni serutnevdA

It was about 4:15 A.M. when I awoke this morning, the night still perfectly dark, the streets empty upon all views, and with Luke standing over me, wearing a wifebeater and some boxer briefs. "Joel, get up. We've got to leave in about" -- he glanced at his phone for the time -- "half an hour." I grunted and made some various sounds. "Now's a good time if you're going to take a shower," he added.

I got up out of my bed, grabbed my watch. I pressed the glow button; my watch face lit up in a nauseous green, showing it was 15 minutes after 5 -- no matter since I had not set my watch one hour back to reflect the change in time zones from Korea to China. Yes, it was nearly time to leave, and the sun had not even risen.

The water in the shower was warm. No, it was hot, the hottest I'd had since before I left Lakeland. I stood under it absently, my right hand relaxingly clutching my left behind my back, as the water ran down in columns between my forearm and my spine. The muscles there were soothed, and my feet felt light in the pooling heat beneath, the weariness of hiking the Simatai portion of the Great Wall no longer in me. I forgot myself.

When I emerged, clean but still unshaven -- you see, I'd brought no razor -- I got dressed and brushed my teeth, and finished packing my things: The t-shirt I'd purchased; the postcards to send home; the painting for which I'd paid too much; and the fan which would be for my mom. The dirty clothes were included, too, and as payment for the additions I'd made to my bag while in China, I had to carry my iPod and books in my jacket.

No cabs waited for us when we got downstairs. No cabs stopped for us. Loren complained of the stale cold, Luke of the quietness, all while I shuddered and propped the neckline of my jacket up to the lowest strands of my hair. I commented how unfortunate it was that the hotel's security guard had to stand out here and call our cab for us, because we would be unable to tell the driver how to take us to the airport.

Soon enough, a driver showed up who could take us. We threw our bags in the trunk and piled in, with Luke and Loren in the back. I sat up front for the first time. The driver smiled weakly at me, uncomfortable at my broad smile back at him. He drove slow at first, oblivious to our exigent requests that he get to the airport fast. But it didn't matter: So early in the morning, traffic was such that we arrived in 30 minutes, with plenty of time, enough to shop at the duty-free stores, to chat amiably with fellow travelers over the scams we'd each befallen -- and to sleep, intermittently, at our gate. Sleep: It was just about the only thing we felt we hadn't done in Beijing.

We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl

At this time tomorrow, I will be in Beijing, China.

My snarky comment: Yes, be very jealous.

My sentimental comment: I wish you could be with me.

January 13

The canning jars upon your sill
no flowers yet partial to their touch
they're cold as ice come every night
as they reflect the glow of your television
while you lie in slumber
and those visions around your head
enfold me into your creases

And I felt your shadow shrink
into my chest
as you offered up your climb
to show me all your paper airplanes
against the light of your lampshades

The window crawled open
to the sundown
and the light outside was a small, intractable beam
as it cast your silhouette
and talked you into bed
moving you
like a whisper in the tall grass

And when I woke up, the world was old

News, fish, and meaningful messages

The long-promised updates will arrive shortly, I assure you. If I gave you a snapshot of the various tasks currently nagging for my attention, it might help you understand the delay.

1. It seems that with my move to Korea, I've started a migration out of Lakeland, perhaps even all of Florida. In the past couple weeks I've received a lot of e-mails asking for information on Korea, on teaching, and how to get out here (or at least out of Florida). So it's taking a while to answer these. Those of you who've received replies know how much information there is to give, and even on overload, some minds still have more questions.

Why am I so helpful?

2. I am working on new photo albums, complete with witty captions, ellipses, and prearranged, non-chronological orders (so as to achieve full impact). These will include highlights from my vacation in Singapore and Malaysia, a new entry in my Korea by Digital Proxy series -- you'll get to see my apartment -- and photos of most of my students, for you to adore and be envious of. All these will appear on my facebook.

3. I have spent too much time watching the NFL and NBA. No excuses, I'm just a fan, and a bigger one than I thought.

4. I haven't been sleeping well since my return from vacation. Perhaps it was the time zone change, or just the change in environment, but I have been waking up frequently every night. So I am tired, and not in any shape to be writing well into the night.

5. This will contradict some of what I just said, but I've also been writing lots of other things. My journal has seen pages many blank pages filled lately, and there is the matter of that series of blogs on economics I've been writing for the Campaign For Liberty website.

Nonetheless, I will write more, and with greater substance. Perhaps it was the scope of the trip, or its nature, but I've felt a relaxing of my shoulders, as whatever invisible weight I toiled under fell. I feel fresh in my perspective, and awake to the world again.

As a teaser, I offer this: my next story concerning my vacation will be about how my life was saved by a Malaysian prostitute. "Saved" may be an exaggeration. Maybe.

The premise of a promise

Today I got into a (very) brief discussion about my dislike for making promises. Specifically, I don't ever like to make hasty promises, and most of the time I refuse to offer my word unless I know I will keep it. But why? Why not just say what is easiest to say, and consider later whether it is practical to keep one's word?

Here is my opinion, cut and (very) dry.

Never make a hasty promise, for such promises are only made to satisfy one's ego. And such satisfaction should only come from the fulfillment of a promise.

When a promise is made, one's pride is risked, or should be. Too often, though, people make a commitment without risking anything: they deem their oath fulfilled simply by taking it. The motivation to make a promise should be pride. The man who makes a hasty promise really has no pride at all. If he did, he wouldn't be so quick to risk it.

The wise man has considered all the risks and makes promises accordingly. And so when a promise is fulfilled, his ego is properly satiated. Since the hasty promise is made without thought of one's pride, the breaking of it will not mean anything to its breaker. Thus the breaker has no pride: he is a thief, borrowing trust from others as if it was capital, to ameliorate his starving ego, and then never repaying the debt by keeping his end of the agreement.

A promise should not be made to satisfy one's own ego, then, but rather to test it -- to see if his pride really matters to him.

Inanimate irony

In front of the trash can:


Meanwhile, behind it:

Border Crossing: Malaysian Edition, Part 2

The train was jolting awkwardly, and with alarming frequency. It was 11:30 p.m., and we were bound for the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur. I had the luxury of having two seats all to myself, but try as I might I could not get any sleep.

Oh, jesus.

In front of me were a pair of raggedy foreigners. The man was wearing green and white checkerboard shorts and sporting a beige snap brim fedora on his head. He was musclebound under his white shirt. The woman had dirty blond hair in dreads and was wearing a multi-colored striped poncho. Her face was tanned to the point of outshining her eyes.

I was near the front of my car, in the second row back. On the wall at the front there was a large flat-panel television (about 42") playing soap operas and cartoons. At one point it played the movie Poseidon, regrettably. God, what an awful movie. I swear I'd've enjoyed an Ernest flick more.

As the train rumbled, and my interest in my books waned (and since I could not write, what with all the swaying), I focused on the family sitting across the aisle from me. I have no idea whether they were Singaporean or Malaysian. They were a man, his wife, and their three children: a girl, about 16; a boy, 9; and another boy, 4. Their skin was the brown of a varnished dresser, their hair black as the wiring of a screen door, looking tattered. They were quite beautiful.

The girl had my attention the most. She was gorgeously simple: a red turtleneck and blue jeans, with light sandals. All her skin looked sweet. Her hair was in a bun, and she had a smile white and full. Her fingernails were sharp, and she had a precious, fragile neck. I had her in my mind.

A few minutes later, we arrived at the last stop before entering Malaysia. We disembarked and headed mindlessly past relaxed guards into the spacy hall of the customs check point. It was dimly lit, cavernous, and all concrete: whispers and sounds hurtled across the open areas before being absorbed by the only things there to absorb it: people's clothes. In a family of 4, a boy was playing with a yo-yo; a woman, traveling with her husband and parents, chatted intensely with her mother while waiting in line; and a solitary man in front of me stumbled through the clear plastic gates that headed the queue. I had my passport handy, and was ready to use the bathroom as soon as I got through the tangles of this bureaucratic process here.

I was officially out of Singapore a few minutes later. Unable to sleep, I turned over in my mind the thoughts of the adventure, of the rush and fracas to accomplish what little might have been done in what had barely been a full day there. I thought kindly on the couple who graciously offered a seat at their table, so I could eat before leaving the zoo. I remembered awkwardly the accents of the people, wishing how I was not deaf so that their speech did not necessitate repetition. I blandly recalled the hours spent lost in search of my hostel, always taking the poor advice of well-meaning strangers that my destination was a long walk away -- when really it was just two blocks over, past the motorcycle shop and the night market.

There were 7-11s everywhere, all over the place. I snapped pictures with humor, thinking up witticisms to be used as captions when I posted the pictures online. Trees could not be found, except in richer areas, or in the wilds of the city. The streets and sidewalks were amazingly clean, desert of litter and trash. The public transportation system was crowded always, but nevertheless easy to navigate.

And I saw a beautiful girl at the zoo, who smiled at me as I walked through the jungle-themed archway of the entrance. She was tearing the stub from tickets, and handing the remainder back to patrons, like myself. I blushed at her, and thought to make sure to see her again as I left. I wanted to say hello to her, to walk up to her and simply tell her how beautiful she was, and to make her blush. But when the time came for me to leave, she was not there. No matter. I had a train to catch, to Malaysia, to the next stage of my journey.

More than machinery, we need humanity

I am not given to the use of the words and thoughts of others to express my own feelings. But tonight I witnessed nothing short of a grand poem, an unfolded monologue of passion, in part of a film so bitterly funny, and so bold, that I felt the need to share it, unblemished by my perception.

Here, for your refreshment, is the closing soliloquy by Charlie Chaplin in the movie The Great Dictator:



Apart from its context, this speech loses none of its potency. The film, however, remains strongly recommended. The wonderful fact is that this ending follows nearly two hours of sharp commentary, and hilarious antics, on the bribery of tyranny, and the hard blanket of despair. I laughed, and applauded, and felt whole the grasp of its arm, as it plunged me into itself, to relate, and to feel as Chaplin felt. It is one of the best films I've ever seen.