Tag: Cold War

Conversant program

If it weren’t for people like Shawn, I wouldn’t be where I am today.

You see, Shawn was a shy Penn State student of  the Horticulture department who wanted to volunteer his time.

It turned out that the Foreign Student Conversant Program matched us together in our first year of college.

That year as it turned out was my best year: how to pronounce “hor”, like in “whore-house”? onto going to frat parties where Shawn finally joined.

There are aspects of English which come across to learners as incomprehensible (what’s that silent “P”  doing there in front of “psychology”) to euphemisms we invented as we go along like “enhanced interrogation” , “assisted suicide” and Leanning-in/Leanning-out.

What Shawn did was :

– he showed me that he cared (by listening more than talking)

– he was trying to cope with the new situation on campus himself

– he was way ahead of the curve on environmental awareness and his calling in that direction.

We lost touch even during college, but I will always remember Shawn for his kindness and friendship.

The last time I saw him was at a frat party, in a crowded Greek-alphabet house off-campus.

We did not talk much that night besides acknowledging each other across the dance floor. So much for being “conversant”.

The fact that we were there in the same room, him rushing the fraternity and me rushing for life in America, said it all.

It was an unusual pairing: he from rural Pennsylvania, I big city. Shawn had not seen nor heard any noise except for Fourth of July fireworks, and I, witnessed practically every Cold War arsenal exhibited in the hot theater of war.

We found each other through the International Student affairs program. We often got “sexiled” (again using Tom Wolfe‘s term) and both felt proud that “WE ARE”  “PENN STATE”.

In our age of globalization, where a small dispute in the South China Seas could trigger a major war (Tonkin Resolution whose Pentagon Papers will be declassified Monday, and now China vs Vietnam with territorial disputes), we can use a bunch of “Shawn” for soft-power influence.

I did not tell Shawn much about my failed attempt at the US embassy in Saigon, or about my subsequent floating in the salty seas.

That fact was understood as subtext over rootbeer and fries. Shawn with a beard, and me hardly had to shave at all.

I wonder what he made of me. I just know that out of the 30,000 students on campus, Shawn was my friend, the very first one.

And the only one I have ever known to pick that particular major. I learned a new vocabulary out of him, if not a whole new appreciation for volunteerism. I learned another concept later in life: “paying forward”. To me, Shawn triggered a chain of events which last way past his freshmen year. He, in today’s social media parlance, essentially “friending” me, conversing instead of chatting. I miss those face2face days over rootbeer.

Paradox, dilemma and irony

Paradox: doomsday for all is not coming, doomsday for one, anytime (especially when you are old).

Dilemma: too big to fail, the book then the movie (might not make it big at the box office).

Irony: got to have a job to land a job (hence, the growth of internship i.e. free  labor).

Underneath it all, we still act out our primal instincts e.g. sacrificing a virgin to appease the gods (common good) via new forms: NINJ loan, TARP and foreclosure (sub-prime borrowers are enjoying free rent before the eviction notice got nailed on the door – yet, the process flows just one way: driving people out on the streets where they were supposed to belong in the first place).

Meanwhile, debtor’s nation will soon face intense competition from China, whose agriculture population now stands at mere 10%.    http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/2/433041d0-8568-11e0-ae32-00144feabdc0.html#axzz1NHwUmam0.

Their service sector is growing and scrutinizing every loose brick in the American fortress: from refrigerators to automobiles, from helicopters to pharmaceutical research.

One interesting note from history: during a visit to Pakistan, former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger faked a sick leave to take a side trip to China. From there, the Cold War was practically neutralized, setting the stage for today’s multi-polar world. Recently, we saw how Pakistan was once again used as staging area for America’ s new battle ground.

Pakistan, our new dilemma (Please return the SEAL helicopter, and do not forward to the reverse engineering lab in China).

Vietnam, our new irony.

America, filled with paradoxes (loose sex and loose religion, long list of millionaires and high level of national debt, highest incarceration rate yet land of the free).

Dear readers, you got the gist. Connect the dots for yourself. Think, think, think. Apple “think different”, so they make the I-pad 2 through Hon Hai, whose subsidiary Foxconn kept having its factory blow up or employees jump the dorm’s rail. Tell me there is no modern-day sacrifice of human being to appease the gods of consumption (last year, we just wanted an I-pod, now we want an I-pad) and I will tell you to think again.

Heterogeneous country, homogeneous thought

Google CEO blurted out what we all know (that tech moves at 3 times faster than other business sectors, who in turn, are 3X than the government). We are analog-built e.g. eating,  buying and thinking habits, while techies thought processing power is on a different plane e.g. Cold-War B53 bomb in TX is finally being disassembled and junked.

A Swedish public health expert gave a TEDx talk some years ago. He put up some slides which span 200 years just to show how entrenched we are in yesterday’s thinking (e.g. that women in emerging nations have a lot of children while the opposite is now true). In short, formative years continue to cloud our lenses (or our teachers’ who got their data from post- War textbooks). Another stat: more deaths from suicide in the US (mostly men in their mid-50’s) than from automobile accidents. Or more Christian in China, than the membership of the Communist Party.

Or  thanks to rural broadband, the creative class in the US can finally afford housing and pursuit their passion, let’s say in software programming, in 2nd-tier cities like Seattle, Austin (as opposed to New York and San Francisco).

One more thing. Back in the days when America found it hard to accept a President who was Catholic

and the only “Muslim” brother who left his last name blank (X). The Big Three in Detroit, Big Three in Broadcasting, and a healthy middle class, with Union wages. Now, things get splintered of, with MNC’s paying zero domestic tax (GE), and CDO peddlers paying no COD (it’s still a mystery that Madoff was the only fall guy – whose rehearsed bio was …”I was an underdog when I started in brokerage, so I got to have my revenge at ‘them'” ” we contemplated suicide but it’s our son that followed it through). The same tax codes hasn’t been 21st-century compliant enough to catch clever white-collar looters.

Meanwhile, across the pond, it will take another three decades for China’s branding to rise (The Chinese Dream) just as it has taken them 3 decades to ramp up manufacturing and exports. Reverse engineering will be followed by reverse branding. Their state machinery will be hard at work to take apart every element that make Cola and IBM global brands.

(try to top Steve Jobs, the marketer who still got marketed in his death: simple and elegant cover featuring his signature stare).

First wave will be tourists. Second wave, engineering students . Third wave, marketing catalysts, Huawei and Haier, try to pry open the US-EU domestic markets (foreign in their perspective). At today’s speed, even Toyota with its continuous improvement still can’t compete with revived brands like VW.  It seems that John Le Carre is not the only one whose career and mindset are stuck in Cold War era. Cuba still has 1950’s automobiles crowding the streets. At least, we must admit they don’t make things like that any more. Should have kept jobs in Indiana, and not India.

Things were moving quite rapidly at the bottom line, and slow at topline.

The Bond elements

I like Bond, James Bond.

Unlike Batman, Bond shows his face, grace under pressure and yes, his penchant for “work hard play hard”. But don’t ever doubt his loyalty and commitment to serve the Queen.

The franchise still commands a huge audience with formula that works: Bond got a mission, Bond got captured, and finally Bond (good) triumphs over the force of Evil.

Even in his worst day (often in captivity), he manages to carry himself with dignity.

Throughout the heated exchange, we can still detect the mutual respect one enemy has for the other, since they are both cut out of the same cloth (sometime with the same training if it’s a mold).

In this multi-polar world, the makers of the Bond series are scratching their heads to fit the square Cold-War stick into today’s round hole.

We got the tech nerd, the unflinching boss, the girls, and the side kick.

Most importantly, the villain? It is commented that already the latest Bond character is portrayed with some dark elements (he is more vicious in seeking revenge for his accountant lover – at one point, his boss had to cancel his credit card – no more gambling!)

What ever personification of Evil in our next Bond film, we know the producer has plenty (location and lyrics) to choose from. Just look at the headlines. Read the cables. Peruse the now declassified materials (from the Nixon era backward).

The reason you and I like Bond films is because it set us up (first with the playful teaser, then it drops us cold into the situation e.g. kidnapping etc…which demands immediate ransom or resolution). The window of opportunity is small, very small and the urgency is great. Just don’t question Bond’s resolve, and ours in this case – because fifteen minutes into the film, we already suspend of disbelief.

Every few years, they held a casting call to select a new face to play Bond, James Bond.

For us, loyal fan, we took this occasion to renew our faith in Rousseau‘s Social Contract, in the Golden Rule, quid pro quo and non-zero sum game. Just  “good triumphs over evil” formula, Bond or Batman.

 

churning, down the river

The foreclosure process has still been at work, churning homes back on the market in CA or FL.

Behind the statistics are people bewildered and shattered.

As a nation and the world, we are faced with two choices:

– pretend it never happened, and rush out to shop

– acknowledge that it happened, and rush out to shop.

Kid Rock on American Music Award a few years back sang about his hometown Detroit.

Something about “bringing us to our knees”. I realize that technology and market , when in sync, offer us convenience and low costs. When collided, as in collateral obligation, forces us on our knees.

It makes you feel like you have just been eliminated from being America’s next top model.

Pack your bag, and leave the set. Now!

Do you have some place to go?

Of all the misfortunes  that beset this country e.g. Dot.com burst, 9/11, Katrina and the two wars, lower our confidence a bit: an Ireland with lost pride, China with deep pocket-book, and Russia asking, hey, dance anyone?

First thing first, Covey advises us. A nation, as a people, needs to learn good habits.

Focus on the most important and work everything from that core (rocks first, then pebbles into the jar).

We have put out big and small fires. That leaves us too exhausted to do what’s next and necessary. The rules of law, the checks and balance etc… help protect us from abuse, but not in the realm of economics.

When do we see you hungry and not feed you? Or without a roof over your head and take you in. Rolling down the river.

 

seeing daughter

My father often went off to see his daughter, my half-sister. My brother tried to see his son from a previous marriage every few years or so (coast to coast).

Now I found myself in the same situation: seeing my little girl whom I took back from the hospital 19 years ago. I am sure she is just as excited as I am.

We won’t miss a beat. Those DNA resemblance.

But the social setting is going to be different. It’s going to be a third place, neither home nor work place.

So I chose Ben and Jerry. At least, that’s where I used to take her. Small vanilla, in the cup.

I won’t feel awkward. I will feel like I am in touch with my old self.

We anchor ourselves in people and places, even as time moved on. In hard times, we got demoted to the lowest level of Maslow hierarchy of need: survival.

I know I live on through my daughters. They love life, and laugh with friends. Both of them show my outlook on life i.e. no matter what happens, don’t let the world rob you of your smile.

Face tomorrow with optimism and not self-sabotage.

Appreciate the past for what it is, but not letting legacy dictate the terms.

Never get yourself into a box (eventually, one might have to, but still with the option of having one’s ash scattered into the seven seas).

I don’t know what I will say to her today. Most of my lessons, she already learned. I cannot help her prevent heart-break or headache. Time and Tylenol will do.

I can only be there, surviving on my term and timetable. And I know, like her, I need a father who will mark the passage of time, by his unique reaction to stimuli. Some fathers reacted worse than others. Most try their best to live up to this parental role.

I am proud to say I have tried my best. I hope I have earned my stripes.

The rest, I leave to chance. After all, I was on my own at her age, facing extreme uncertainties and ill-fated future . I made it OK. And I know, I know, hers won’t be the same. It certainly is going to be better.

So, my meeting will punctuate not with a goodbye or good luck, but with congratulations for her sure and certain victories. I see them even before she comes to realize it. That’s what father is for (to mark historical context).

I bet my life that she will do me proud.

P.S. As of this edit, I see the younger one over Fourth of July. Same DNA. Same tempo.

She likes corn and peaches. We went to Water Park. Got sun burned but a warming heart.

Time will destroy yet heal at the same time. My mistakes, your lessons. I took her to visit my old house, old school and old neighborhood. I was at that age, at that tumultuous time. Presidents were assassinated, upheaval everywhere.

I was growing up real fast. Got a good dose of cold reality in my face and the future seemed less certain with each day.

How can you explain the Vietnam War to a ten-year-old? The past can only be understood from the future. At the present time, even with Presidential archives and declassified materials (on top of leaked Pentagon Papers), scholars still debate and dialogue.

Oh well. All eyes and ears are on the Egyptian scene and streets. The urge to splurge has moved somewhere else.

As long as ammunition is spent, and human lives wasted. Such is the affair of our world, our post Cold-War world.