Tag: Bono

The racist that is us

The world mourns for a beacon that was Mendela.

It rains in the stadium and inside the heart.

Racism was an ingrained system up to the Civil War, fought in World War, struggled in the 60’s and onto the 90’s in Apartheid.

We simply don’t like color folks, first in speech, than in hush-hush, now only in thoughts. Keep it to yourself.

But if it’s the Huxtables (neighbor, doctor and well-mannered) than it’s OK.

Recently down in Florida, it still happened when a nephew of a resident got shot in a struggle. Zimmerman got off free, than later, in jail for beating up his girlfriend. A diametrical replay of Rodney King who also got arrested for other charges after the LA riot.

Man inhumanity to man spreads across the color line.

What Nelson Mendela did which made him great? He simply went to a ball game (just like Rosa Parks who chose to sit in front of the bus), and not a soccer game, but a Rugby game (lilly-white). He refused to be drawn into a downward spiral, the mean streak of violence piling on top of violence, which eventually destroys both sides. This cycle polarizes us, and perpetuates itself,  inflating the dark side in each of us, the racist part. Studies show that fear passed on from generation to generation, that includes the fear of the bogeyman.

For me, Mandela was more than a symbol of reconciliation, or racial struggle, or political triumph.

He was and remains my symbol of hope. Of thought leadership. Our Gandhi. Creative problem-solving, while setting aside personal feelings (and the urge to take revenge).

27 years of honing his thoughts and feelings in confinement.

Of nursing the dim light of hope. Of  life-long learning.

Then, boom! Stadium and podium, concert (Bono) and ball game, Bishop and President.

Sometimes, in traffic, a minute is too long for us. And when pre-judging someone, 5 seconds are too long.

The racist in us needs a re-education. Be it 27 years or life time. But start now. To understand and be understood. What if you were born dark-skinned? or white for that matter. The burden is on us to reach out, to say “Hi, my name is….. Good to meet you”. I know a friendly person when I come across one. Don’t you? Because if we don’t, we simply transfer that fear to the next generation, and before we know it, history repeats itself due to our ignorance or inertia. Then, some facist or racist leader will rise (hopefully with another style of greeting if he/she is creative enough) and recycle those stirring speeches we all know so well ” they took our jobs, they come with strange ” costumes” etc…”.

Then the crowd will nod, and the crowd will call themselves the Majority vs the Other. And mass hysteria will take over

The right to bear arms etc… and our children will have to do it all over again. I hate that, don’t you. So mourn, but not too long. Mendela would rather see us take action, smile at strangers regardless the size of their bodies or the color of their skin. It only takes a small effort to reach out, to click on the mouse and send a text or endorsement. Recognize the racist that is us, and manually override it. Let not your small inherited fear dictate how you behave in today’s world. I hope that world is full of Mandelas, full of hope and humanity. We got work to do. Let not the small stuff steal  our game of Rugby.

un film de Coppola

I heard “Bonjour Vietnam” again last night…”un film de Coppola…”

http://stanmark.multiply.com/reviews/item/9?&show_interstitial=1&u=%2Freviews%2Fitem

It evoked psychedelic images and texture of horror (adapted from  Conrad’s Heart of  Darkness.) Yet we were sitting in a boutique studio, with aged ladies sang along to Le Uyen Phuong’ s Last Word to You , equivalent of Bono and Cher: “let’s lay down one last time, kissing and caressing as primates in the wild.”

To top it all, we were introduced to an Anglo singer who performed three numbers, two of which by Trinh Cong Son, Bob Dylan’s equivalent of Vietnam (Ha Trang and Diem Xua).

For a moment, I was unsure of where I was: America? Vietnam? What time zone was it? Good Morning America or Bonjour Vietnam?

Both sides have paid a hefty price for the conflict that tore both nations apart: the anti-war movement in the States and the still-have-work-to-do integration of  the new Vietnam. Unlike in “un film de Coppola”, Vietnam Today has to manage the ever rising expectations in a flat world.

“Just want to overtake Thailand” commented an engineering department head at a Community College. Well, at least on two occasions that I knew of, Vietnam did just that: SEA games, and rice exporting.

Tourism is still up for grab for both countries.

The upcoming two-week break will see a lot of domestic touring.

Vietnam will see an exodus of its people taking buses, trains, planes and automobiles, just as  American comedian  John Candy and Steve Martin portrayed two strangers met in a snow-stranded airport.  In Apocalypse Now, our main character also came home, with chopper roar in the background overlayed Sheen’s narration ” I have found the enemy and the enemy is us”.

Coppola ran over budget multiple times (Dennis Hopper was half-stoned during the entire shoot).  But somehow, it turned out to be one defining movie of that decade.  To juxtapose 2012  (with dooomsday written all over) with the images of Apocalypse Now is to be redundant.

Vietnamese growing up all over the world can relate to “Bonjour Vietnam” who was sung by a Vietnamese-French girl.  They are curious, but have no context for their immigrant legacy. To self-protect in our age of data deluge, they partitioned their hyphenated existence from their parent’s experience. But the more they try, the stronger the grip (which according to sociologists, will manifest fully in the third generation). Eventually, both generations will have to reconcile and negotiate a truce. In Vietnam, it’s peace time. It’s America who is still in the state of war or readiness for war.

Bonjour Vietnam. Happy New Year. Let my people go.. home. Let them read from the tablet. Hopefully on it we will find:  love God and your neighbors (far and near) as you would yourself i.e. fight not without , for the enemy,  as found in un film de Coppola, is us.