smell

Greetings,

I love the smell of Cambodian garbage and rubbish in the morning. It is a sweet sick smell.

Did you know the nose has trillions of sensors? It's one of the most highly developed human senses. This delicious aroma wafts through the air on ballet slippers. Why do you love the smell of garbage and rubbish in the morning? It reminds me of human consumption and dancing dervishes in Konya. Where is Konya? It is in Turkey. Turkey is a tomato based culture with a long history between east and west. Sniff.

Really? How is it possible to live between east and west? Well, they have an Asian side and a European side, like a double edged sword. One edge of said sword is fired to a fine point in Asia with Chinese propaganda tools. The other side of said sword is forged near Greece by Amazonian warrior women. 

They wear sunglasses and ride around in horse drawn carts finding tomatoes, natural gas (a buy product of consumption) expired optical dioramas and an emotionally withdrawn fictitious computer hacker named Salander in Sweden.

Can you show us the connection between: the smell of garbage in Cambodia, Konya, Turkey, a computer hacker and one breasted Amazonian warrior women? The mathematical uncertainty principle is an equation.

Metta.

798

Greetings,

Living in a huge art museum we can never escape art. Where does the artificial end and the real begin?

798 is a district in Beijing where artists collaborate and present their vision, similar to the Left Bank or Greenwich Village.

798...

Wu Yuren, an artist who led a public protest over land thieves was recently arrested. “You don’t realize how arcane this system is until you have to deal with it,” Ms. Patterson, his wife said. “It’s a nightmare.”

NYT

Metta.

Painting

Greetings,

'A mountain loses its spirit without cloud, loses its peculiarity without stones, loses its elegance without trees, and loses its life without water, and In painting, one should concentrate the mind, and hold the breath: with concentration of the mind, serenity is maintained; with the breath held up, preciseness is attained.

'One should be as serene as an old monk in meditation, and be as precise as a silk worm in spitting silk. The spirit and real fun of painting are from nature and beyond the brushes and paints.' - Chinese painter

Metta.

Arrested development

Greetings,

You know life is fraught with the unexpected hammering of stone cold ice when a Tibetan environmental activist gets arrested for teaching people to pick up litter and plant trees in Sichuan, China.

His demise came when he accused a local Chinese big shot official of poaching. Poaching is a no-no. Talking about big shots poaching is a no-no. Picking up litter is a no-no. Planting trees is a no-no.

The No-No chattering xylophone, said, Let's teach this Tibetan wise guy a lesson. His henchmen concurred. Track him down. Arrest him. Charge him with trash collection and gardening offense #101. Call the judge. Tell him to sentence this monk to 5 years of hard labor with no chance of parole.

Mr. Trumped Up Charge judge, jury, and a very close friend and economic confident of Mr. Local Big Shot performed his Social duty. "You are charged with splitting the nation!" 

What? Planting trees isn't splitting the nation. Picking up trash isn't splitting the nation, said Rinchen Samdrup.

Oh, really? said the judge. Let me see. Ok, how about poaching? Yes. It's all hear say. You said my friend the local big shot was poaching. You lied. He loves his country and all the animals. If you lied about his poaching to make huge financial profits from leopards, tigers, bears, eagles, antelopes and stolen male babies, how can this court in all fairness find you innocent of planting trees and picking up trash?

I'm innocent. No. You are guilty. You are an environmentalist. You want to split the nation. You are a bad boy. I sentence you to 5 years. Bye-bye. 

The judge whispered to the prison warden, Fill up his cell with trash and trees. 

Metta.

Reuters...

Sam and Dave sleep

Greetings,

The bent nail gets hammered down, yelled a Chinese teacher next door to my classroom. 

The Maija artist accepted the photo from the grieving relative set up his easel, using a magnifying glass to see the face, using a pencil to capture the 8x10 likeness. On the chipped plaster walls were examples of his work; peasants, farmers, aunts, uncles, husbands, wives and young and old Pioneer communist members with tight, tight red scarves knotting their necks suffocating their passion. 

Today he was sketching an old unsmiling stoic woman. A sad resigned peasant. These were people who had suffered. They’d suffered at the hands of the nationalists then the communists, then the new economic revolutionaries. The indignities of old age.

An old three-string wooden musical instrument hung on the wall near red streaks of paint inside this fine art museum. A black fly on the left shoulder of the artist rubbed its feelers together. Tasty. 

An old man with his emaciated skeleton face and paper thin arms carefully opened a bag of tea and poured tight compressed leaves into his bony right hand. He dispersed this into an old chipped blue pot and added water. We shared tea watching the artist work. The artist was good. The likeness was close to perfect. The tea was delicious.

The same kind of images decorate the altars in Vietnam. They sit in various temples around the cities. Death is a big deal. Ancestor worship. 

Do all the ancestors hear, understand and acknowledge all the yelling? Yes. Do they open their mouths and request a little peace and quiet? On anniversary death days they meet all the other ancestors inside narrow mazes of alleys where piss, drain water, used cooking oil, daily slop and vicious liquids drain into punctured cement holes flowing along narrow passageways slanted toward the middle where voices become echoes? Yes. 

The dead formed a rubber stamp committee to address family noise. ‘It’s come to our attention dear comrades, dear people, dearly beloved family and friends...that we have a communication issue here in the neighborhood.’

‘Silence! We are trying to sleep. The long peaceful and restful sleep. Leave us be.’

Metta.