Thang Nguyen 555

Somewhere along the line, our intended message is lost in translation.

We meant this, they perceived that. Even with ubiquitous communication technologies, with Edit button, Delete button and Comment option.

Quick to transmit. Too late to learn we are intrinsically different ( hence, the need for audience analysis, segmentation and not bunching different groups e.g. Asian American into a monolith).

People went to war (WWI) at times because of simple and rectifiable incidents. Other times, manufactured ones (currently).

Cultures do collide, just like cars. When they do, we have culture crash. With no junk yards, body shops or insurance deductible.

In Good Morning Vietnam, our D.J. protagonist eagerly went on a date with an ESL student. He was teaching her “Hello” and “Goodbye”, yet he did not know, he was the one who was supposed to learn the nuances of culture: her whole entourage showed up for the date. I know this well. I was once that little boy in the back seat of the car, playing chaperone on my sister’s frequent outings with her then, not-yet wedded husband.

In Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot, Tina Fey and her Afghan interpreter saying goodbye without a hug: their hands touched discretely while he handed over her suitcase in front of those ever watching eyes of the Taliban-entourage at Kabul airport. With Vietnam and Afghan wars, Television and Twitter war respectively, behind us, we can improvise explosive device but we cannot change culture (the women of the village just did not want water into the home. Leave the village well alone . Why? they want to socialise, catch up on gossip and away from watching eyes of men).

Iran today, Saudi today and even Russia today. All come across as strange to American. What’s all the fuss about women driving, covering their heads and cutting their hairs in protest? Culture collide. We need to allow modernity to take its course. Its speed and spread most times, elicit our Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot (May I show you something? the Minister of Culture unveiled a hidden bed in his office. So much for Minister of Vices and Virtues, with American-back dollars).

The Culture Industrial Complex tells us everything is the same, yet everything changes. Pick and choose. Adapt and move on. Some entities might take centuries to come closer together (China vs Vietnam). Others, decades (EU). Most will never meet in the middle (Russia, China and US/EU). Why? Because we still operate on age-old patriarchal structure i.e. one ruler at the top. Command and Control structure doesn’t tolerate nuance and context. Binary is simpler, even machine can handle it. Either/Or. No wonder at the Paris Accord 73, the multiple factions could not agree on the shape of the negotiating table (round or rectangular).

Something always gets lost in translation, hence forced choice. Meanwhile, we’re born and brought up in sub-groups, within a larger group. At times, we wish we’re living in a melting pot. Other time, salad bowl. Currently, a Yin-Yang divide. Who is going to bridge the gap. Technology was designed to help, but it also speeds up mistakes (Reagan hot mike “we’re beginning to bomb Moscow in 5.” Likewise with Gary Hart or Alex Jones. After last year, Facebook and Twitter are no longer the only games in town.

John Keegan said of WWI : “All because most the July crisis were bound to the wheel of the written note, the encipherment routine, the telegraph schedule. The potentialities of the telephone, which might have cut across the barriers to communication, seem to have eluded their imaginative powers. The potentialities of radio, available but unused, evaded them altogether. In the event, the states of Europe proceeded, as if in a dead march and a dialogue of the deaf, to the destruction of their continent and its civilization.”

Bogged down with gears (materialism and efficiency) most of us don’t give enough attention to cultural differences. Just ask the volunteers during the Vietnam War, or Afghan War who came armed with idealism. Stove pipes. Shocked before surrendered.

A few months ago, I ran into an Afghan girl who volunteered as an interpreter for her people at a local Health Fair. I see myself in her (being one myself shortly after my arrival to Indiantown Gap, PA). I wish her the best. And that there wouldn’t be more of her (refugees of a future war). But then I know it’s just a fortune-cookies wish.

In life, people are lucky enough to get by. The poor shall always be with you. Who to help? Are they of an inferior race because they are poor? Instead of heart and hands, we offer guns, germs and steel. It’s always a complexity beyond any one person to solve. As at the end of Whiskey Tango Foxtrot, Tina Fey visited a wounded vet just to be told: something is always outside of our control. Move on.

My intended message is this (so we don’t misconstrue each other): you and I are different (background etc..). We told the “machine” what we Like after filling out an account with demographic details. It then tailors, limits and filters what we see, hear then repeat/rinse in a machine-generated hypnotic and hyper loop. No surprise we all grow narrow-minded over time, while tech connects and collects.

The 80% non-verbal cues are begging us to play culture detectives. They are more important than the verbalized 20% (tip of the iceberg). BTW, bring extra cash on your first date, if it’s across the cultures.

As a child, along on my sister’s date, I remember she had a fight, slammed the door and walked home. Leaving me stuck in the back seat with her date as my driver. I was in luck: he carried some cash since I wanted an ice-cream for my ordeal and for playing a reconciliatory role in the drama.

Paul Tournier said, “Nothing makes us so lonely as our secrets”.

Those moments when we felt more like Fredo than Michael Corleone. Fredo, played by Cazale, half Irish, half Italian was at one time in a relationship with Meryl Streep (also in the Deer Hunter where she played a Vietnam draftee’s bridesmaid in a Slavic shotgun and send-off wedding who in a spur of the moment, accepted Christopher Walken’s proposal – best man and bridesmaid coupling).

In real life, Streep stood up for Cazale so he could finish his production contract. With cancer – unplanned but manageable – he came across feeble, hence a bit ill-suited for Nam (missing out on those Russian roulette wagers, a script originally pitched for Vegas).

Also appeared in Sydney Lumet’s Dog Day Afternoon, Godfather 1 & 2, the Conversation, Cazale was made for second-fiddle roles. Our water boy. “Stop playing around with that (handgun) – here, Nam’s Russian Roulette wager “click” – sweat or blood).

Like a Jim Croce’s line “every time I tried to tell you, the words just came out wrong “; he couldn’t quite defend himself, physically or verbally – not a quick wit – more than often he froze, on a hunting trip or bank shoot-out, terrified with gun – Carbine – to the side).

Subdued and weak (swirling around on a tiny moped in Gene Hackman’s confine sound lab – in the Conversation), he was more a sound man than cameraman (often taller like Michael Douglas in Three-Mile-Island prescient role).

Chris Cuomo of CNN was furious when called “Fredo”. DJT was also mentioned in the same breath when he grandstanded (the Divider pg. 137).

I turned one when both siblings were in college: hence, chores for change. Why not! Someone had to off-load my busy mom.

I know what’s it like to have my Fredo moment. heck, Fredo life. I once was in tears at a friend’s father’s funeral – to a fellow Penn Stater’s surprise. Perhaps I used the occasion to offload my pent-up loss i.e. my father was left behind in Vietnam for a good decade while my friend’s dad “wasted good wine”, hitting tennis balls, in State College.

Other time, a TV producer talked shop jokingly to have me cover Three-Mile-Island melt-down live (an intern was supposed to be expandable = like that sound man in The China Syndrome, fiction incidentally, released a few weeks before real life). When my brother got married again: “Your turn to take care of Mom” (family first). But, but…. (no “but”).

It’s settled – by the new Godfather (that) Fredo does Vegas. Spined-off to outer “Siberia”, his first self-determination to stand on his own feet in the desert on behalf of family (mafia) interests, then fell prey and seduced by a sense of false belonging (indulgent and decadent sub-group – his new “family” sense of belonging, whose “Sinatra” figure face down on the massage table.

Fredo, our outer most electron, experienced “de-individuation” (that stripping process that molds a neglected household member into a cult member, reinforced by mob behavior and herd instinct). The Stockholm Syndrome.

Strong men are quite magnetic. After all, they are “anointed”. the Othering = the weakling. We “are pre/destined” for bigger dreams. F*** the fear (foul language was intended to shake loosed old ethics and stoke his rah rah Mad Max base).

“No one listens until and unless we take up arms.” “Shoot ‘m. (Thailand toddlers at a day-care). Rape them, rob them (Thai pirates on Boat People). Results? record-high guns death. Killing as a way to get attention and be immortalized (9/11 martyrdom?).

This is for all lonely people on our lonely planet and On-line: faster connection, fewer commitment and minimum accountability (spam and hacking). Attention-starved and all spread thin. Before the internet, it’s existential loneliness (TV screen).

After the internet, it’s exponentially existential (myriads of “others” – just popped up per software recommendation – always and mysteriously “suits” our propensity and temperament without algorithms like Fisher Temperament Index in match.com).

Petabytes of personal data on X and Meta, Twitter and Tik Tok. Don’t ever call me “Fredo”. It’s the “n-equivalent”, like “gooks” and “illegals”. He who dies with the most “like” wins.

When I am weak, I am strong. Go ahead and call me “rooky gooky”. Strong” Saul-turned-“weak” Paul – a 180-degrees U turn – from “righteous kill” to “love is kind”. No wonder those in a lower caste empathize more – for the meek will inherit the Earth. Beggar shows beggar where (stale) bread is. At this edit, R.I.P. Pope Francis, Jesuit and champion of the downtrodden.

Meanwhile “Genius”, forsaking their stewardship, tend to exploit and extract, from Mother Nature and others – even in the name of Manifest Destiny – for personal gain. “Screw it, let’s do it”. Of all the money poured into building bombs (while borrowing money to finance ammo factories), a tiny fraction finally is, unplanned, in the hands of common folks, taxpayers, in the form of ARPANET. Yeah! The equalizer 3.0.

Cazale was in four films that I am aware of. We don’t often think of him as an Oscar-winner (Best Supporting Actor) or Meryl Streep’s boyfriend. He ‘d just “done time”, sweated and bald, slumping on the floor at the bank corner or ride in the front seat (Dog Day Afternoon).

We want Robert De Niro (or Michael the Marine) to return and save his fallen friends. Rambo-like. John Waye as Jesus. Revisited and white-washed history in Honorable Exit (or a banker who “saved” 113 Vietnamese, getting a kick and taking his time during “fifteen minutes of fame” e.g. obtaining intelligence from a hooker’s relative).

Yet, our uniform-clad hero hunter had his sudden “Fredo” moment, just like all of us (as he leaned back and hid out of sight in an airport taxi, skipping his own Welcome- Home party – feeling awkward and undeserving: “Johnson, how many babies you killed today!”). It’s one thing to pull a prank by taking on a dare i.e. running naked in the snow; it’s another to see or cause Kim Phuc running from real hot napalm like a Berkeley jogger.

In the end of The Deer Hunter, our decorated veteran, tried re-entry i.e. got a deer in crosshair. Unlike his subsequent failed Russian Roulette rescue mission, he got a choice: enough killing already! (My Lai, Song Thang, Song Be with napalm/agent orange). Recreational sporting once enjoyable, now self-projecting. Heroes got secrets too! Can’t get his friend back but he could let the deer go! Imago Dei (God’s image in man’s mind).

So Catavina guitar solo fades in – Clairton hillside mid-70’s scene. The feel and the fear of being seen as dim-witted unlike 1945 Times Squares iconic kissing sailor and the nurse).” I feel a distance, far away”, he uttered, still in uniform. The last six-inches are the hardest, especially when she happened to pick your best friend over you (only to see her – Meryl Streep’- fiancée went AWOL).

Out-takes show congenial Fredo getting slapped around, tossing and throwing empty lunchbox in the air like Blue-Collar cap.

Every day is Graduation Day at the School of Steel. This is for all the lonely people, thinking life has passed them by… All the “Stevie” of Vietnam.

Nothing makes us so lonely as our secrets.

Featured here is the baby in Ghostbusters 2, then and now. Cast? an added member of the Ghostbuster team. Crew? Those who did the animation and special effects.

We are never an island. In fact it’s a series of Hello and Goodbye to an ensemble of folks. There were at minimum 4 when I was born: nurse, my mom, my sister and my cousin. My cousin has passed away. Her husband a M.I.A. Ranger at the end of the Vietnam War. She, an un-consoled widow, died without closures regarding husband’s whereabout.

Our lives as films, would not be whole without cast and crew. My film started in a shared maternity ward with other moms and babies.

Then the fun started. Traffic, dust, accident, in-fighting, power-grab, religious strife, ideological struggle, espionage, colonial interests and proxy hot war. I of course did not process all while “ inside the movie “ except for memories of flooding and fighting, thieves and bullies, demonstration and assassination.

My recollection was a bit hazy: the burning monk I eye-witnessed had his flame and flash (Malcolm Browne photo) at 10 AM. I had it down in long-term memory as happened around noon. We all came of age in fear of sudden turn of event: the Diem’s brothers, the Kennedy’s brothers, the Generals and those plain-clothed C.I.A. ‘S who yanked me and my friend out of the long visa applicant line at the embassy on the days leading to April 30, 1975.

Daddy, x-army turned salesman, punched a condescending co-worker who insulted him in French ( both were Vietnamese). Friends in school had higher-ranked fathers in our militarized society. A friend’s mom , wet-market food vendor- filled our plates for free. Kindness and cruelty co-existed. Smokes get in our eyes (tear gas and sudden departure)..

Arrived from the opposite end of Ellis Island, to augment and update the American immigrant experience, we were light in luggage and high in hope. Even when landed on our feet to face the unknown, I never forgot my friends, my father and my fellow men still back there.Among whom that cousin who I finally got around to visit a quarter of a century later. Sitting on the beach, same spot where I had my last – or thought as last – glimpse of home, I experienced quite an alt- reality.

The crew was the 7th fleet US Navy. Many fellow sojourners- have passed on. Their passing taught me about the business of life. So, I keep on Learning by living. Learning by leaving , learning by letting go and by losing that which I cannot keep. Biologically we were wired for survival: breastfeeding and baby food. Then adulthood takes hold, that’s when the table turns: we are responsible for all the ill and good in our world. Without charity I am nothing as in a Pauline line.

No more burning monks and burning drafts. Today, just us, immigrants from a different shore. Facing the music and mirror. Our turn at the “self-evident” Truth. That all men are created equal. As I was saying, the cast and crew – in my case a group of Science Professors at Penn State- gave me a karmic nudge. When something strange happened, who are you going to call? Like that baby in Ghostbusters 2, I was thrusted into a boiling pan right out of the ward with just a few trusted faces.

Yet, I wouldn’t trade my life for anything. It’s gear for next gig. One cannot appreciate enough those helping hands along the way: point A (childhood) to point B (adulthood). It takes cast and crew (even in Ghostbusters 2) to live a life in full.

Thank you all.

The bully pulpit. Megaphone. Crowd herding. Stove piping. Gaslighting.

You got the gist.

Every so often, we thought of change or be the change only to find the grass is not quite greener.

How about going back to when we were “freer” men? Only men? Our Colonial past, a nation of slaves in pursuit of happiness? The East Coast Elite? The Business Party-turns blue-collar and vice versa.

Where do we put God in all of this? which side? how to colour him (purple).

We will rule in the new era. will noose those who are “weak”. Blame it all on them, ship them somewhere else, up North. Back in the 80’s, America conveniently blamed the Japs. For the height of the yen and low costs of their cars.

(check out Trump’s Playboy interview 1990 ; at least Angela Merkel did before NATO meeting).

Our casino boss tosses the dice, at times with the Democratic Party, and other time the Republican. As long as we pay no tax. As long as it’s transactional: Mike Pence, my Mike. Until he no longer is.

Noose him. He is weak (just like the Lake Tahoe scene in the Godfather where the weak brother was choked and tossed).

Strong men survive, in the arena and on TV. Can’t afford compassion and empathy. Those belong to Stormy Daniels of the world. We are about winning (Lombardo’s the only thing). Greed is good.

China, Russia and N Korea leaders are strong. The likes of which you have never seen.

Beautiful letter (I had it somewhere).

The bible which I had to borrow from motel 6 was for prop, just like St John for backdrop. White American Jesus. Not Black Moses.

You see, I like myself. No, strike that. I love myself. I am the Alpha and Omega. There has never been one like me. I alone put things back to where they belong (the British’s ?) This swam needs God who is shaped and speaks like me. Today, you will be with me in Paradise (Palm Beach) with Putin and Xi Ping flanking on either side.

Don’t be doubting like Thomas, or disloyal like Judas. I know a lot of rich Nicodemus (who call me at night). Like Murdoch, Carlson and Hannity. They worship me. Don’t you?(tk for your servitude).

I was on TV. I created reality – alt reality as my Conway once said – and built the best brick-and-mortar which employed my family (which is the extension of my best whiteness- my daughter – also obsessed with looks, could have been my VP, and her husband, whose father finally pardoned by me, could be me someday). Omnipotence. We’re the chosen (if not, I alone can pardon). Doesn’t matter what law I crossed (I fire you, not the other way around. What public service? What oath? Ask not what your country can do for you? That’s the other East-Coast Elite). The past doesn’t count (today’s friends could be tomorrow’s enemies). S Korea for a moment there was scared stiff. Yesterday Cold War. Today Culture War.

So, blame blame blame. Delay, delay, delay. Deflect. Keep them on their toes (Guessing game), per Kissinger’s advice. You’ve got to be a statesman and a prophet. Mirage and mirror. See? right there. In front of you. See it?

Gosh I hate the glaring of artificial light (need to walk off that 60-minutes set). When asked by Leslie Stahl why I had discredited the press? So that bad news about me coming from you are also discredited. Just a little insurance when I dominate the news, good or bad , as long as I am out front of the 4000 lawsuits with my name on them (the Divider). Omnipresent!

What else would you like to know? That I watch anything besides Fox? I’ve got itching twitting fingers. Drove me crazy when I no longer make people jump just by posting those 140-characters. Out of the 40% of American currently believe anything I say ( inerrancy) I just ask for a service fee to build a Christian-nationalist country with project Jericho. You’ve got to pass the citizenship test, get baptized and vote for me. Me, me, me. At the precinct level per Bannon. And most importantly, “Like” my post. See, I am a self- promoted self- divinized narcissist Who will not be “defoxified”. No way Jose. Can I have that cheeseburger now? How does my hair look!

We’re done here. Got to reach for my remote control. Carlson is praising strong men, among them me. L’Etat c’est moi. ( I would have pulled a Tiananmen Square at Lafayette Square if I had my way).

68-69 time frame.

Average age: 21.

3/4 in support role i.e. in Long Binh, Cam Ranh Bay…where padlocks, lots of padlocks, we’re to secure troops supplies.

The rest: in combat platoons. No R&R in sight. Often times, wounded. Carried and Covered in ponchos.

We’re starting Middle School (to us, it’s Big League, since in Vietnam, Middle School in the afternoon, but High-School was taught in the morning, with same and shared facilities). Of course I chose music as extra curriculum. Of course I auditioned. Of course I got picked.

But that was ahead of the story.

Our first school live concert featured “He ain’t heavy”.

Our school was all-concrete, not green-jungle. Yet I felt the emotion, trembling with in each note from the harmonica solo. “It’s the long long road”…(the decade before, we’ve got “On the road”. Decades later, we’ve got “The Road”.) But that year, right after Tet 68, we’ve got “the long long road”, and victory was not in sight…perhaps “a stalemate”.

Peace (withdrawal) with honour. Carry him. He ain’t heavy. Get the Hell out of Nam. The joke of the day was “what? you’re gonna ship me to Nam” (I am already here).

Our class did not start until the city had cleared the gun smokes, and grenades (like going back to school post-pandemic). And the music “M, I love you….with a love that never ends” (Quoc Dung) somehow made everything feel “normal” again.

I thought I had found an outlet for my restless soul. While real Californian got shipped to Nam, we who were in Nam, dreamed of California (All the leaves are brown, and the sky is grey)

Of that class 68-75, in my section – which was in the back of the class – all tall guys – struggled with growing pain. all were Black and Brown belts, except for myself, the singer and screamer, a White belt who broke an arm first month into Hapkido. The rest of our crew: one injured in the head due to a traffic accident (50 years on), one came back from the front with only one good eye, one in a wheelchair after trying to steady a fallen steel door from crushing a child. others escaped by boat to finally see California Dreaming realized.

He ain’t heavy. He’s my brother.

Those who stayed behind had the work cut out for them: from sunrise to sunset and beyond, hand-to-mouth existence. I know a classmate who turned deaf after a tour of the Cambodia war. It’s our Vietnam war (the previous one, they called American War) or aptly put “the Killing Field”.

Which American war? please specify. America got into a lot of wars. It’s a military industrial complex, churning out ammunition supplies by the hour. Billions and billions of ammos, luckily, this time around gets put to good use: stopping Putin.

He ain’t heavy. Never has been. From Zelensky to my classmate. My brother. My Dad. My brother-in-law. My neighbour (whose casket was draped in flag). My cousin-in-law who up to this day, was still M.I.A.

He ain’t heavy.

Average age: 21 (some died younger)

Most smoked Pall Mall, Marlboro, Lucky strike and Salem. Who gives a s… about lung cancer when one can die any time. No prospects of an R&R in Bangkok. Hey baby. Bang! Bullet-struck. On Human tissues. Through the Flesh and not flak jackets.

He ain’t heavy. Our classmates of 68-75. In wheel chair, with pirates’ patch or on constant dose of tranquilliser over half a century. Been a long long road….winding road…lead me to your door….don’t let me standing here.

We’re “half a man I used to be”. It’s Yesterday. Live and let die. Yet, per Marlantes, young men were pushed into playing God, to pull the trigger and decide the fate of others. No wonder PTSD. No wonder opioid.

Back then, the average life expectancy was 50-60. It’s in our “twist” song: “how long can you last: 60 years of life”. Then it proceeds to divvy up into three parts: first 20 for education etc… extremely fatalistic with no regrets amidst death and destruction. No wonder the soul of Vietnam lives on, while it’s body withers. Think again! America or Vietnam? Which country engages in more wars?

Perhaps it’s a stalemate. Both sides got wounded and unhealed for those lucky few who got carried to medivac, to a M.A.S.H.-like tent back at the base.

He ain’t heavy.

He’s my brother. I went on to take the mike. And we performed at inter-school show. Among the songs: California Dreaming.

Things they carried. On a small boat. Up State, Up North. Draft-card burning. Bras burning. Hell No, We Won’t Go.

Except this time, it’s Russian. Not long-hair hippies of a Woodstock era.

I remember a concert by Paul McCartney in Moscow way back after the Iron Curtain fell. Youth everywhere just want to hold each other (Love Story) and swing with the music. It’s universal, international and to be expected.

Yet we have Fed’s policy (Paul Volcker’s name resurfacing ) and draft policy. As if human lives could be suppressed and manipulated (they once played human chess).

Repeat.

It’s been 211 days into the war in Ukraine. When it first started, I thought of my neighbors: husband, Russian – wife, Ukrainian. They must have grown numbed by tuning out bad news from afar. We all did way back when I was growing up. Pull the shade and put on the tape. Slow Rock. But eventually what’s “out there” is finally here, at least, for Russian youth, and the 80,000 new dead (Vietnam claimed roughly 60,000 US’).

Mother Russia. Crying over dead sons/daughters. I’d rather see them holding hands in outdoors concert… “when we’re young…our life is an open book….live and let die”.

War and Peace. Yin-Yang.

Population control? Territorial control? Zelensky kept repeating:” We are fighting for our lives” (while you for Democracy or territorial integrity).

Both are right. But the difference is enormous: life and death, arm-chair theology vs real crucifixion. (in “Majestic” the movie, we witness a change of heart when our protagonist decided to stand up for principles against the mighty power that be).

Rinse.

In Vietnam, when fighting wouldn’t get them where they had wanted, all sides resorted to and relied on Election (manipulable). Hence, half-country (like soup and half-sandwich). Johnson was torn between his “Great Society” (and which of the 3 networks to watch) and the war afar. Hence, the draft. Twitter’s founder’s father was 19 when he first landed in VN. Bang. Bullet. Dead.

Back in this country, per a documented account, Election Day now was dreaded as a hazard on par with a potential terrorist attack or natural disaster (Leibovich pg. 221).

There will always be wars. We came, pre-wired and predisposed to warring. Conflicting desires. Wanting vs Needing. What gets me is, warring, and by extension, stirring up controversies and divisions, must be very profitable. After all, why wouldn’t our former President condemn Putin’s act of aggression? He has had 211 days to prepare his tweet” draft. Oh, it’s bad for the brand. It’s not a positive proposition to sell. Zelensky! Find me some dirt, then I’ll sign the military aid package.

Repeat. (Johnson, Nixon said something similar to President Thieu, for the record). The “Palace files” were then conveniently classified and upstaged by Watergate.

The things they carried. Across the pond. To wave a different flag, march to a different drummer. “When we were young, our life is an open book…live and let die”.

Just now, on live TV, I watched the crown, Queen’s, placed upon the altar. Rested on purple velvet. Royalty at rest. May she rest in peace. We all sooner or later join her. May we R.I.P. as well.

The end. Most important event in all of life (we’ve got no say as to our lineage).

I wonder if the Queen or today’s King, often think about the luck of the dice. How they just happen to be there, then. Blessed and extremely lucky to the point of, per selected theology, “being chosen”.

The last time I watched similar funeral, was when she herself sat in partitioned booth, utterly alone to say goodbye to her wedded husband Philip.

This time, her turn. Well conducted and watched. Everyone asks for mercy…”we’re but dust….like flowers in the field”…Eternity in one hour.

I too am very aware of my fate, future and fleeting hope of an eternal life. For the lack of a better term. I know “eternal” doesn’t mean chronologically eternal, or our transitory life would last forever. Just “eternal”.

Perhaps it meant we would get to sit at the table, to be present at the party and have some champagne.

Could somebody tell Putin, Xi-ping and lesser dictators i.e. wannabes: “please pause, think a bit about your fleeting lives, then think of others’…” “blessed are the poor…for they shall inherit the Earth”…

Perhaps in her death, Queen E did pull her utmost weight: towing an entourage of world leaders, making them ponder about past and present Kingdoms.

From Egypt to England. And maybe, maybe, they will be a bit more humane, and less cruel towards others under their charge. For a moment there, I am hearing my own calling ” go ye unto the world and be a force of good.” Do No Evil, you hear, Google.

Still searching, both online and offline, for that heart of gold. And I am getting old. Nearing the end. Without a crowing moment. Unlike she. Our Queen.

It would never be the same Britain, same Bond, same BBC with extended reach and enormous influence e.g. guns, God and germs. in world history and “sun-never-set” geography, British Naval prowess not withstanding.

While the pipe music began to fade out and Sky News about to sign off, the crown to be on display as museum piece, I wish your days be fruitful and filled with warmth and kindness towards our fellow men.

In this case, it’s quite symbolic. Kick it all the way up North, where they belong i.e. with the NE liberals, the humanitarian, rhetoric meets reality…Here. Your immigrants. Your heart delights.

The political football. Venezuelan. Long ago, it was me. A local church which sponsored a Vietnamese refugee family was using me to motivate them (to find work): “Look, he has just arrived the day before. The next day, he found work…albeit night-shift janitorial” (they had obviously been told that “these people” needed to be self-sufficient immediately given the anti-sentiment of the post-VN era). You should have seen the face of the long and curly hair boy in leather jacket, obviously came loaded and more prepared for the US.

Everything (human bodies included) is up and qualified as “political football”, to be punted, tossed, thrown, carried and Hail Married.

After all, it’s the Fall and football season in America. Push them back, push them back, way back.

We love to be aroused. Stimulated. Nudged and pushed. Especially when it came from a bullhorn.

Slogans need to be short and sweet “take back our land” “back where you belong”.

Quite a schizophrenia: “Give us your huddled mass” yet at the same time “We’re not an open border”. Hence, PBS’ The US and the Holocaust series. (Aired by appointment only).

That red rope is not open to everyone. Got to grease the palm. Cash. Lots of it. America = Studio 54. We’re the good fellas.

This land is our (rich folks) land. First-mover’s advantage. Us vs them. The Others. The Venezuelan. The Vietnamese. The Venus (OK, let them in. “I don’t care, do U?”).

It was said that President Kennedy once told a close friend regarding Madame Nhu “that bitch has to stir everything up”… Quite a seductress. Dragon Lady. Affecting the course of a nation. Out of her sheer will. She was the one who punt the ball back then.

Now, with the desire to beat the populist drum, to shout from the bullhorn…people once again punt the ball. To up State, the Ivy League and the elite. Let them handle it. Go Dutch on hypocrisy. The unborn we love. The ones. who by sheer accident of birth, who are here, send them away. We’ll pay your way. By the bus load.

From San Antonio, we decried the inhumanity of that human-trafficking driver whose truck was without A/C which caused the death of many. Yet from the same town, rich FL governor uses state-coiffeur – the next link in the coyote chain – to pay their domestic connection to Martha Vineyard. Beautiful Island, the likes of which you have never seen.

In the US, at times, human = football, to be Hail Married and punt to where they belong.

The 80’s music if you can recall: Boy George, the Police and Bowie. Concert for Bangladesh (My Sweet Lord) and of course, Eurythmics. Every move you make….I’ll be watching.

My niece, in one of the early pictures, stood in the background, while I, foreground. She was watching me and whoever took the photo.

We’re never quite alone. Not now, not ever. With ubiquitous mini-cameras, drones, and surveillance satellites in the age of AI. Good luck. Privacy? what’s that! Crime is down? perhaps a bit deterred, but never gone away.

The camera inside our head is called memory. I was born right after the partition of Vietnam. Throughout my childhood, I had been watching every move everyone made: the way my Dad combed his hair, slick back with “brilliantine”, how my principle wore his glasses, or the head teacher walked around hands behind (hiding the long stick).

I watched the war outside, and the war inside my family. Then how the war inside of me acted out after years of watching, absorbing via osmosis. The education of me. Albeit contrarian and countercultural, like Bob Dylan who rebelled against the rebellious 60’s by turning to religion in the 80’s. “Gotta serve somebody…Yeah, indeed”.

God has been watching over him. The machine over me. And my niece over all of us. She turned out OK BTW. Thanks for asking. Now her daughters are watching her, in turn. We learn from role models. My sister’s hair on her wedding day looked just like that of the Dragon Lady’s (Madam Nhu). The Diem’s brothers, the Kennedy’s and the Mario’s. Watching one another in the way of dress and even mannerism.

We know, or should know, everything is an illusion. Yet we seek status and want to rise above everyone else, with wings made out of wax. Like Icarus flying high toward the Sun. All the while hoping others are watching our spectacular ascent (soon descent, since what rises must come down). One exception. Our protagonist Holden Caulfield, across the street, shooing his beloved sister away. Please go home. Stop following me. Stop modeling after me. Live your life. However, it turns out. You’re not in my charge or I yours.

I did not say anything to my niece. Did not even know she was in the background of the photo. I was just struggling to make it through the 80’s, this side of the Cold War after getting out of a proxy Hot one. Gotta serve somebody, yeah indeed… Every move you make, every step you take…I sure hope Our God on high has been watching. Making notes and marking down all my faults and favors. One day soon, when this life/illusion ends. He and I will have a sit-down to square it all away. Can’t wait. Meanwhile, it’s time for another concert, not for Bangladesh, but Balochistan (Pakistan) (I want to see you Lord, but it takes so long my Lord, my sweet Lord).

Sept 11th’s 21st anniversary.

19 hijackers. Turning Boeings into bombs. 3000 deaths.

We’re all shocked to the core. Even today in looking back.

How could people be that cruel? How could people be that courageous and selfless (to die for others to live).

On that day, on flight (UA-93) we learned all about humanity and history.

That it is a mix of good and bad, of twists and turns.

Like the weather. Climate Change. People change. History evolves.

Yesterday, someone was a 73-year-old Prince. Today, King.

You can float down a lazy river in TX, or river-raft to the unknown (with a banjo soundtrack as Burt Reynolds & friends in Deliverance), and time will take you there (unintended destiny) even with the best-laid plan.

21 years ago, the only plane on the sky late that day was Air Force One. No one knew what was going on. Hence, bunkering and hunkering down. Peter Jennings was still alive then , with rolled-up sleeves, tossing from one live camera to the next (PA, Pentagon and NYC).

Eyes glued to the set. Television, not Twitter, ruled.

Fiction? or real? We all were in total shock. Those imagery were so surreal yet real. Lives were at stake. People stopped on the 41st floor of WTC stairs to help carry a lady in her wheelchair down to ground floor (CBS-News). Firefighters and first responders rushed up to their certain deaths. Brooks Brothers store across the way all covered in dust.

We were proud of being fellow human beings (TX barbecue, anyone? until we dig up any survivor). We were horrified by those hijackers – their grievances on live TV (I need to insert my own pet peeve: I wish those Thai pirates barbaric acts of raping, robbing and killing Boat People on South China Seas were on live TV 45 years ago). Finally, their leader’s head was cut off, files retrieved. Splinter groups have been re-branded and re-grouped to fight ad-hoc battles in Syria.

It costs a lot for those folks in Guadalupe, TX river to float. For Californians to have A/C while outside temperatures are above 100 degrees. It costs lives and continued defense of freedom and free living 21 years after the fateful day.

Preventable? Might be. Future versions of that script, rehashed for next generations, since it’s always been a Cain and an Abel, at each other’s throat.

That’s why history has always been a look in the rearview mirror.

Of regrets, of reviews and retrospect. Let’s forget OBL, and remember Todd Beamer/friends. Even when one of them was a gay guy from SF. Heroes are heroes, heterosexual (and Christian) or homosexual. As long as they stood up and sacrificed for us all to live in, often times, complacency and comfort.

Thank you, guys. R.I.P. Your selfless acts are inscribed in my book, never to be forgotten – more so on this day of 9/11. That day, my friend and I were watching TV, ABC-news, which still was anchored by Peter Jennings. His subsequent cancer death was partly due to a smoke he shouldn’t have touched.

Smoke gets in our eyes that day.