Tag: Shopping

My Cuore

If you look, you shall find. In my case, that little book by Edmondo de Amicis, translated of course.

It made an indelible impression on my little mind and heart. Years later, it still does. That is, after I have come in full circle, have travelled and traversed the geography of the heart. That “diary” genre though fictional, is more potent than Ann Frank‘s. To read it, you put on an Italian shoes of a school boy.

Bully, respect for others, compassion and empathy. Even patriotism (not trendy today).

To set this book, and its content, against the backdrop of school shooting, let’s say in Newtown, CT, or failed attempts else where, is to contrast night and day.

I went to French school. So this translated version must be one of those first Vietnamese books I read, besides Adventure of Tin Tin and The Three Musketeers.

In Cuore, you have enormous respect for the teaching vocation, and how it does take a village to bring up a boy. In our Facebook dominion, I am not sure how old values can fan out in cyber space. Do we bring old clothes to a poor classmate? Visit an old teacher (friending him?)

Subliminally, those values have triggered my many humanitarian action.

Now I trace back to its source, My cuore. Not the Italian heart, but  the human heart. It is translated into many languages, many outside the US. Perhaps it wouldn’t “sell” there. Not in the land of xtreme sports, female wrestling and lately, imported “girl with the Dragon tatoo”.

I rebloggd yesterday on Small is Still Beautiful. It was an old book from college. Today,  Cuore, an old book from Middle School. Both are still unpopular, yet both are still influential, to me. I hope you will at least wiki them, see what they have to say. The first book was Economics as if people matter. The second, we live among, with and for others. It is apt to coin the term Global Village, since we all go to school, get online and go home at the end of the day on Spaceship Earth. What if it is damaged, attacked or invaded?

We have enough resources, technologically, to solve human problems.

Now, do we have the courage and cuore to ennoble ourselves with bold action!

What happened to “Next Level”?

If you followed job ads or start-up pitches, you would be hearing “Next Level” multiple times back then..

In the 90’s it was “synergy” (M&A terms). Before that “re-engineering” (The Japan that can’t say NO). Now, it’s “collaboration”.

The Recession inadvertently served as an Editor who cut out words that don’t fit with the times.

You can’t promise “Next Level” when all you do is cost-cutting, the same with “growth” in the time of austerity and sequester.

The best we can hope for is “business as usual” i.e. keeping the lights on (and the heat).

Housing crash created excess inventory, abandoned homes – sold for $1.00- and owners turned renters.

What we thought was security turns out to be insecurity.

ADT stickers, still visible, serving no purpose.

It’s not “safe” to live in your own home when the whole neighborhood were foreclosed.

Now we need the return of synergy and neighborhood watch.

We need neighbors and community.

To come back to the question, what happened to “next level”. The bubble busted.

It has reached its limit, speculation that is.

The quants are hard at work.

The marketers are not , since  companies are not expanding.

Everyone is busy “collaborating” i.e. cost sharing, ride sharing and burden sharing.

In down time, we rediscover the value of inverted synergy.

Like roommates in the dorm, or our parent’s couch.

Hard times don’t outlast tough people . Hang in there, until we meet again, at the Next Level.

Say “cheese”!

I touched on this slightly in another blog. It’s about growing up never knew if my grandparents even smiled at all (I gathered this from the black and white photos in the family album).

We are still shackled by the analog world which tells us to stand straight and stare straight into the lenses (36 poses max).

Yet cameras are now built in the smart phones. It’s digital. It’s universal almost.

So why not say “cheese”! Every moment is now an event… the outing, the posting caught on camera.

Picture-taking used to be a Christmas event to document how babies have grown. To make post cards and greeting cards.

With online convenience, we now send greetings digitally. It’s fitting that I pen these lines an hour before the coming year of the Snake.

My parents used to whip up some poems to welcome the New Year and refresh our spirits.

It’s a necessary reboot.

Everyone works hard there in the East (more manual labor than Industrialized West). The hot weather makes you sweat all day.

A/C is for the white-collar folks.

If you were to document in photos a day in the life of an average worker in Vietnam, you would find that he/she gets up very early and tries to beat traffic and everyone else.  He/she either goes for a run before sunrise or not at all.

Then strong coffee. Then chopping woods, so to speak . People either divide up a huge chunk of meat, or newspaper delivery folks a huge pile of papers, or lottery sellers got their tickets at predetermined gathering points.

When the sun glistens, open air markets are already in full swing: fish and fruits, eggs and noodle.

People have breakfast and people have fights.

All in a life of an average worker. Traffic smog and traffic accidents. Back to and from work. Then the night life. In full swing. Snacks on wheels at night market. Bangkok or Saigon. On the waterfront, or back in the alleys. Life at its rawest. Capture it on camera.

Let it go not. Why wait. Things won’t stay the same. In our life time, we saw this digital revolution. At least, future generations can deduce that their grandparents indeed say “Cheese” for the digital cameras. Back when I had my TV internship, that regional station was still hanging on to half film (with dark-room processing of news reels) and half tape. I am sure it has gone completely digital by now.

Loosen those tight grips of the analog shackle. We have yet seen the full implication of complete digitization. Who would still laminate a classic book, knowing that it’s available on Kindle. Yes, we have seen rising unemployment, which was a result of automation and digitization, which in turn, is causing underemployment for others. The 55-hour work week will soon be reduced to 35, to accommodate incoming workers.

Work less, enjoy life more. What else can we ask for standing on giants’ shoulders and inventions of the 21st century. Cheers!

The grains of time

By now the transition from analog to digital has almost been completed.

Movies, music, photos and books. The old movies are easy to spot: actors using huge phones and driving old cars.

Vinyl albums made those hissy noise when touched by the needle.

And books, like the one I am reading, War and Peace, are so heavy. You can’t help realising that you are entering Tolstoy‘s Imperial Society.

Physical versus digital world.

24/7 always-on grid vs our 16-hour world (8 hours for sleep).

People, through connection, find suitors in the old world, friending others in the new.

More atomized more access, the new takes scarcity and locality out of the equation.

Just Google him or her.

Follow him/her on Twitter (despite the miles apart).

The social graph shows his/her photos, Likes, and Time Line.

Little Red Riding Hood was told not to trust strangers (wolf in grandma’s clothing). Now she is encouraged to click Approve, and upload every details of her waking life.

Yet those grains of time as appeared in old B/W photos speak volumes about our ancestors. Mine always seemed to appear in groups, staring straight and standing straight. It’s as though they had all been military cadets.

I have gone through life, never had a chance to see if my grandparents even smiled at all.

Now, with X-Gig memory cards, we can afford to leave behind traces of happiness. Limit not ourselves to event only, since everyday is an event. Monday, Monday, it turns out that way.

Having said that (technology enhances self-expression), I must give it to the previous generation whose movie theme music remains unsurpassed. Think of the old James Bond theme music (three cheers to SKYFALL which has just won the Golden Globe),  Moon River, Love is Many splendor Things…. You can always tell their genres e.g. Big-Band or string guitar. The 50’s gave birth to subsequent women liberation and self-expression in couture, hair dyeing.

Those shiny  but short skirts, the boots, and low neck lines. Furniture and interior decoration was hip as well. Now, with mass merchandising, young men and women took for granted their individuality online while at the same time paying less attention to outer appearance: metro-style, with T-shirts and trans-gender jeans.

While collegial looks are available to all, online “friending” is quite restricted. You need access to your “friend’s” page. Even then, you will know very little, besides what they wanted you to know. More access yet fewer information. Sounds like we are back to square one, with grainy B/W photos. I hope someday I come across in family’s album something resembling a smile. Maybe at the time, women colored their teeth black (to prevent cavity). Hence, the embarrassment. Or that they took pictures with a family patriarch who was stern and strict. Or the photographer had been trained to take ID photos only (no “cheese”. ) Then I remember Mona Lisa, and how we all “read” into that painting a smile that might or might not be there. Obviously, we can see it in her eyes. That smile stood the test of time, however grainy and non-digital.

The things they still carry

The war novel with similar title was surprisingly good. I have known about it for a while, but couldn’t get myself to “carry” it home. Until now. Until it’s translated into Vietnamese.

It’s the opposite of reading Bao Ninh‘s The Sorrows of War in English.

Both novels had the same setting, same period, same conflict, same ending (went down with whatever they were carrying, on their bodies and on their minds).

Sorry winner and lucky loser.

All the while, the sound track for that same period was Proud Mary (you don’t have to worry, for people are happy to give).

In The Things They Carried, supplies were chopper-ed in (chocolate, cigarettes and C-rations). The military industrial complex was “happy to give”, from Hartford, from MN etc…

Rolling, rolling, rolling on the river.

I could barely get through the first few chapters, reading about the members of this fictitious company as they went down, with the things they carried (one of them even carried sleeping pills – for eternal rest).

We can now look back, with recognized names like J. Kerry, J. Fonda etc… at a  safe and rational distance, away from the heat of Kent State and Watergate and My Lai.

I have seen the things people here in VN carry, on their shoulders, on their scooters.

But inside, unless they sit down and tell me, the hidden things that they still carry are scary.

Those with vivid memories are dying one by one, on both sides of the Pacific.

We got scholarly volumes and doctrine (Powell) on the conflict.

And we eventually got Burger King and Dunkin here in VN. It’s like the tunnel is finally closed  with sign which says “Go away, leave the past alone”.

For here or to go?

It’s Future Land now. Happy Land. Disney Land. Dream Land. It has to be.

Yes. Young students carry a lot with them today: book bags, smart phones,  eye glasses, cigarettes, lighters, even IDs. No dog tags. No Zippos. No memories.

Just a bunch of “nic’s” and passwords. Everything is in the Cloud. On Facebook. On Drop Box and Mail Box.

To search for them. Easy. Just Google. In Vietnamese, or English. No translation needed. Sorrows of War or The Things They Carried. Instant access.

Perhaps that war, Vietnam that was, was the last  “hardware-driven” conflict.

No wonder, the things they carried, seemed awfully heavy and burdensome when viewed from a light-weight I-pad.

Growing pain

Tragedy and triumph seem to go hand in hand.

Past pain could be paralysing yet addictive.

Those who couldn’t get over it end up going back to it.

Not for the broken experience but for the context where pain first occurred. When shattered, we threw the baby out with the bath water. In coming back, with time and distance in between, we can salvage the damage tragedy had destroyed.

Since “baby” and “bath water” were together, we always end up with both.

Stimuli and response again. Painful again. Bitter pills to swallow.

I remember my first trip back to Fateful Beach (see other blog).

Later, a few more times, I could swim, play in the sand and regain that childlike feelings.

Pain of the past never remains in the past or at the place it first occurred. It stays and grows with us. Becomes part of us. We are all walking depositories of both pain and pleasure (ask our parents how we did come about). When our brain forgets part of past pain, it’s good amnesia.

So fear not the swim up river. There might still be ambush. There might be not.

Chances for accident and mishaps to happen twice to someone at the same place is almost nil.

But in that far corner of our head recedes that creeping fear of past tragedy. Call it Post traumatic Stress Disorder.

So we close its door, and throw away the key.

But it’s there, growing. gaining weight on its own. A stranger within, waiting  to be met, to be friended with. To be at peace with .

It’s natural and healthy for Black Swan and White one to co-exist.

As long as the duality makes us strong and not weakens us.

It’s part of life. Pain (past and future) that is.

When dreams are gone!

A few blogs ago, I wrote about Noel Decoration in Saigon.

A few weeks from now, the glitters will have been all gone.

Party is over.

Then, it’s a long grind. 2013.

The quants have already crunchedl year-end data: sunk costs, margin, consumer behavior (irrational at times – hint: sell spirits over the holidays).

The monks look on Christmas helplessly. They wait their turn (Buddhist birthday).

Girl friends are hoping loudly for gifts, employees for bonus.

After all, it’s Christ‘s birthday.

The author became a character in a  play he had created.

Empathy. Homelessness. Rejection. Illegitimacy (ask him for his birth certificate).

Our consumerist society has co-opted and corrupted every single occasion to sell merchandise. Together, we build “brand”.

The dream goes like this, “it’s Christmas, the season of giving. So borrow and buy, first for your miserable self, then for those near and far, like them or not. Ship them, don’t like them, then return them. We will send something else, or give you store credits to shop some more”.

Many of these “gifts” end up in the closet along with next year’s wrapping papers.

And dreams just don’t stop there. New Year’s Resolution, ranging from vocational training, weight loss program, and cosmetic surgery. We keep trying, because after all, “life’s a moment in space” with a few surprises around the bend (hopefully they installed mirrors around the curves).

“When dreams are gone, it’s a lonelier place”. In a few weeks, those same hot spots where decorations are now up, will be desolate.

The crowd will have moved on, from Bethlehem to Babel, from cashier to customer service. Next! Return or exchange? 2013, long grind.

Spending spree

Right about now. If the economy is going to pick up, authorities should push spending. Credit card spending.

Gadgets are out. Electronic devices miniaturized. Skirts cut shorter even when it says Winter Clothes. Victoria Secret pulled Native American outfit from broadcast. Planned controversy or not, we don’t know. We just know that things are back to its normal pace.g. Windows 8,  I-phone 5 release etc…

With Halloween behind us, Veteran Day being celebrated, what else to look forward to besides Turkey and Tree.

We got the calendar seasons, then we got shopping seasons, but for centuries we live with only a few seasons (until they made up Fall and Autumn).

Seasons are good for the Soul. They roll in cyclically, to remind us there is a rhythm of life: hard times and good times.

Unlike compound-interests chart and monthly bills. These come in under a different chart and graph.

We still respond to seasons in awe: autumn foliage, first snow etc..

When something like Sandy screw up our lives, we are at a loss (blaming it on those new voiture in China and Brazil?)

Meanwhile, those with or without money still have to spend. For loved ones and for oneself.

Gotta get those midget gadgets: i-pod and tri-pod.

Who would find out that our taste for music has been the same for decades? or what content women read on airplanes (E-readers).

Something strange has happened  lately, but then nothing strange has happened lately (covert ops but overt affairs etc…)

Banks and retail stores are still into collecting ROI perentages. And we consumers still fall for it, willingly.

We are creatures of habit and of harmony. We put on warm clothes and winter clothes. We feel a warmth in our hearts when we see Christmas decoration  all around us. We  miss that fireplace scene and the gathering of the faithful. We long to belong and to be home (Train, plane and automobile) . We long for rest and comfort.  The world knows this. It will offer a different version of our hopes and dreams. It will instead offer false hope and unreachable dreams. It will in fact give us the opposite of what we hope for. In the race to embrace our dreams, often times, we have to outsmart those who claim themselves to be dream providers, of essentials that we need like homes, health and happiness. We gotta to own the process of attaining them ourselves. When we do, we will be rooted firmly in that which we can call home, that which anchors our restless feet and soul. True happiness lies in the heart of those who feel content and are not in denial of death, the only reality that matters most. So spend, spend, spend. But keep in mind that those gadgets will be obsolete next year. In their places, are successive versions and newer generations. That’s what keeps us awake at night.

Progress has its pain and price to pay. To stay in the game, one needs to constantly pedal forward and uphill.

Again, I admire people who stay up all night out in the cold for a shopping spree phenomenon we call Black Friday.

Just remember to leave those pepper sprays at home this year. Walmart is trying to outsmart the competitors by opening early. Thanksgiving night as a matter of fact, for your 24/7 shopping need.

Least resistance

Organizations and people in them tend to take this path.

Status quo. Business as usual. The comfort of routine. The predictable, mechanical rhythm. Makes the world go round. Until we drop out. One person at a time. Dust comes to dust. But the morgue still sends the bills. Please pay by a certain date, or else, interests will be applied. Routine red tape again.

Beyond death, even our own, the system goes on, to claim its next subject (victim), from birth to burial, from cradle to the grave. Have you noticed that we all got wrapped in those institutional blankets when we first arrived, and the same when we exit. They may even wrap a wrist band around us for ID. Try to enjoy sunshine, because the beginning and the end, are all lighted by fluorescent lights.

Path of least resistance. Fight not against the system. Especially Health care.

When you need its services, you are not in a bargaining position. We saw the shake up of the banking system over the last few years. Those shiny lobbies and marble floors, silk ties and slick suits. They jut paid the fine, and moved on . Now, it’s business as usual.

Shake not the system. Follow the path of least resistance. Start here, end there.

We have always done it this way. Get back to the bottom of the totem pole.

Shake not the pole.  We just pay lip services like “the more the merrier”, but the reality is Earth’s 7 billion are not welcome. We are not resource-rich enough to welcome all (you would think with the vast expanse we call the United States, people would do away with Up Stairs Down Stairs, as in crowded Britain. Yet, still “no room in the inn”, and the map got divided into Red States and Blue States. Geography of the mind, more than of the map.) Tighten the border and the security. Status quo reigns. Until death claims one at a time. Just read the NYT‘s obituary page. You’ll see. When faced with the fork along the way, take the road less travel, not the path of least resistance.

Imponderables

Dead Valley is known to be the hottest place on Earth.

Yet millions have traveled pass there on their way to Las Vegas.

Venture Capitalists are also well versed in what’s so called “valley of death” i.e. when a start-up moved pass its honey-moon stage, and simply cannot sustain the burnt rate.

Yet people keep trying.

Then, aside from “death” rate, we got divorce rate.

Yet people keep falling in love, and getting married.

Hint: more shopping and spending for a family of two and more.

In America, there is no shortage of imponderables.

I am starting to read Paterno bio. I could barely get through the first few pages.

Something quite imponderable there (despite the lucid prose).

After all, what happened in America, stayed in America.

Sex shops, butcher shops.

Churches and strip clubs, sometimes near each other.

Schools and parks (for homeless people) near fast-food and donuts joints.

Dental office next to candy shop.

And 24-hr gym (all you can lift)  near Hometown Buffet (all you can eat). Go figure.

America spends a large chunk of change on incarceration, pornography (hard and soft e.g. NYT best-seller list, top 3 are taken by the same author who caters to women taste for escapism), guns and amos (especially amos, modeled after HP cartridge business model), medical marijuana and spirits (that get you on a downward spiral).

My name is Thang. And I am not an alcoholic. So help me God.

Somewhere somehow, the line has been moved: the incarcerated are better cared for than the non-incarcerated.

The top 1% refuses to pick up golf balls, while the rest can’t afford meat balls.

Kids aren’t learning (slipped in ranking), while workers need to but can’t get it paid for by the employers or government.

Politicians are talking, but leaders aren’t leading.

We are bidding for time, for election, for miracles, and are freezed like deers in front of approaching head lights.

Actors are either making quiet retreat (Sundance Festival), or gone overboard (Eastwood and Samuel Jackson).

It’s the best time to be in  late-night comedy.

But SNL fans can’t stay up late (wrong demographic for that time slot).

Voting booths seem to always have problems in Florida. (Voters should be required to have an eye-exam). We are enjoying our time on the deck, but forgot to check the ship’s name. ( Titanic ?).

Even if it’s free, no ride lasts forever.

Every once in a while, we need to check the navigating instrument. No such thing as auto-piloting (Google unmanned car?).

Not in this age of post-innocence. Not at this time of austerity. Not now. Not ever. We need to be vigilant against those who quack like a leader, walk like a leader, but in fact, are not leaders at all. Leadership comes with a price. They come to take credits. This is the root of all imponderables: those who can’t lead, lead. Those who can, refuse to stay in the game.