The Squidboy

Got to work this AM, bumped into Angela, she was kinda bleary-eyed. Whassup with dat, I asked her ("dii mah?" in Cantonese). She said she was up until 2:00AM watching the Obama inauguration.

Angela's about as apolitical as a person can be, so extrapolate. It ain't about the US of A, it's about a lot of intangibles in a perilous global situation, and about a man who transcends mawkishness and genuinely represents Hope, one of the Seven Virtues. I don't mean to get all biblical and gush...Lawd knows, that's not my style.

I don't get much media exposure to Obama, so maybe I'm more sensitive to what I can only describe as Obama-moments. I certainly didn't stay up watching his inauguration, I slept. But watching the Hong Kong teevee news (which I like cuz it's local and often amusing), I caught an OM that tore this blog-entry out of me, just ripped it out by the roots.

The Man, Mister 44, was standing with his wife and simply said: "Is my wife good-looking or what?" (rhetorical question, Mr President), and began to slow-dance with her...I guess this was at the Inaugural Ball, wasn't really paying attention, I was cutting up some coconut-simmered chicken my Filipina maid Susan prepared, it's really good. Dinnertime at the Hammond household, Cheong Shing Mansion, pink and salmon. Well, chicken for dinner, salmon for color.

So BHO cinches up with his wife, who he obviously loves, and "At Last" (originally performed by Etta James, but sung by pop star Beyoncé Knowle) begins to play, and there it was: an Obama-moment.

How much class and charisma can be taught a man, and how much is innate? Look at Al Gore, who spent his whole life in politics and couldn't even win his own state against a weasely egg-sucking dog like G Dubya Bush. Gore doesn't have an "At Last" in his back-pocket, but even if he did, and had been elected (some say he WAS elected but never mind), the idea wouldn't have made the outer-asteroid-belt of the Gore-Advisor Solar System.

Obama is in another league. The moment burst with love and respect. I wept.

As a half-black American, the new Prez carries baggage whether he wants it or not. He's been compared to Lincoln/FDR/Kennedy etc etc ad absurdum, but comparisons to Dr Martin Luther King are inevitable. Shrewdly, Obama has deflected the obvious angle and created new vectors. No one would have said a discouraging word had he riffed on "I have a dream," even just a bit. But the man is thinking, I dunno...two or three moves ahead.

By now you may be wondering: "who in the heck is Etta James?" Knowles knows—she not only played James in the recently release feature film CADILLAC RECORDS, but executive-produced the film (Ms Knowles, consider me impressed). It's an undisguised and unvarnished telling of the Chess Records story, complete with a host of Oscar-worthy performances (Jeffrey Wright as Muddy Waters, Eamonn Walker channeling Howlin' Wolf) and a delightful turn by rapper Mos Def as the young Chuck Berry. Adrien Brody plays Leonard Chess opposite Knowles's fatalistic-femme-fatale impression of Etta James.

The films about the blues in more ways than one, and the blues is about the black experience in America—it's not the ONLY story, you've got politicians and comedians and activists and film stars and Jim Crow laws and Jackie Robinson inserted without apology in the 1947 Brooklyn Dodgers starting lineup and of course Reverend King was a focal point, but when it came time to choose the first-dance number, Obama or some trusted advisor said "let's do 'At Last' by Etta James."

I come from a certain time and for me, Martha Reeves or Aretha Franklin puts the shivers up my spine more than James (or Billie Holiday). But while the crowd would have whooped at any well known Aretha tune, none would not have had the precision-honed torque of "At Last." It was perfect. First-kiss, cherry-tree-full-blossom, paint-the-corner fastball-strike-three perfect. A masterstroke: saying everything by saying nothing.

Perfect, Mr President. Thank you. I have always been proud to be American, but I appreciate your level of understanding, mastery of the language and admirable class. You, Sir, represent me and millions of other Americans, and while you inherit a global political/economic scenario that is far from ideal, you have our admiration and respect.

A few miscellaneous notes: by law or custom, I know not which, the musical composition "Hail to the Chief" may only be played for one man on Earth: the President of the USA.

As for the former occupant, I have a few shoes...err, I mean, words, for you:
"A wistful and occasionally contrite President Bush gave his final news conference in mid-January...'Sometimes you misunderestimated me, he told reporters, a reference to one of his better-known manglings of the English language."



¡Adios Dubya!

Some recent pix and random thoughts.

When I was in university many moons ago, no one I knew travelled to Asia. Being in the Midwest didn't help, but...the idea of "going overseas" was the cliched summer trip to Europe. The paradigm of Asia was, I dunno...Kurosawa movies. The inevitable Godzilla flicks. Delivery of MSG-laden cornstarch-gunk in paper-containers with wire-hasps. Peapods in it.

Later, kung fu flicks dubbed in bad English and all that, and once, a student-organization rented an exhibition hall on campus and showed what must have been a Shaw Brothers film, one I've never been able to track down...they advertised it with mimeographed posters cello-taped to phone poles and I went. Although it amazed me, there was no way of tracking these films and I just concluded it had come from another planet or something—besides, I had other interests at the time.

Never did it occur to me that a person could live and work in a Asian country.

Well, now I lead what must be an exotic life in Asia...but naturally it's filled with the humdrum: bad coffee and stellar lunches and the vicey-versey, work in a cubicle, surrounded by the warp and woof of the culture that spawned that flick "from another planet" and while it's not perfect, whose life is? I'm solvent, I don't have a "hormone imbalance," I'm getting older, I go to the gym, I work too hard, I have fun with my co-workers, I study history, I read and watch flicks and sometimes even sit down and Think About The World. And I take holidays, and come back to my flat sixteen stories above the King's Road in eastern Hong Kong and do it all over again. I'm not perfect, but I'm doing well, thanks.

So, here's some snaps from my latest trip, and these are of Bangkok's international airport, which was occupied by protestors in early December. The shots were taken later that month.


The departure area. Standing room only.


OK, well there's someone having a snooze.


No queues at the shops.


Moving walkways to transport the hordes.


Aha, signs of life: a billboard with happy "diversity in Thailand." Kind of speaks for itself doesn't it.


Half the taps in the men's room have been shut down. Diversity AND water-saving.


No information at the info-kiosk. The repairman will doubtless arrive shortly to fix this high-tech marvel.


Note: this is a series of departure lounges, at a fully functioning international airport, in the middle of the day, during high-season.

Back in Hong Kong, I was idly surfing the Net on a Sunday when noise percolated from the street below. To my surprise, hundreds of marching bands and ensembles were parading down the King's Road in support of Falun Gong.


The Blue & White tide revs up against Big Red.


Jammed: King's Road is a main traffic-vein for cars/buses/trams.


The dull red/gray building marked "Shama" is a new serviced-apartment building opened just last year. The area will also see two new large semi-boutique hotels opening soon. But there is still plenty of local ambience, although we seldom get marching bands.


Anyway, dis my 'hood.

And here's some shots of the newly repainted exterior ot the building: salmon with pink stripes.


For those with vertigo: I'm hanging my arm, with camera, out my kitchen window. This isn't "my view."


Nice to have that bamboo gone after all these months.


This is looking east at my building and down, down, down...

OK, time to wrap up this buncha snaps with a pic of six people in interviewed en masse: people who've worked for Hong Kong's flagship Cathay Pacific Airways for over 25 years. They all worked in technology and had interesting tales and anecdotes. The Englishman in the center, Edward Nicol, is the CIO and told me that Cathay convinced Rolls-Royce to improve their jet engines so Cathay could run transoceanic flights.


The DC-3 they're posing with was sourced in Africa and flown to Hong Kong a few years ago to decorate their enormous facility at Chek Lap Kok Airport: Cathay City. Among other things, CC has a staff-only hotel which tailors room logistics for changing timezones: if you're transiting between North America and Europe, you'll get artificial daylight/blackout curtains to suit the timezone you’re adjusting to, and breakfast at midnight or whenever.

Although the DC-3 seemed flightworthy, Nicol told me the crew carried parachutes just in case!

Wonderful people, wonderful stories. Just another day in exotic Asia, where the McDonalds are open 24 hours and you can even get a decent avocado at the supermarket. Sometimes anyway.

I still like the Dead Kennedys song "Holiday in Cambodia," but its relevance has eroded along with its era. Nowadays, backpackers who a decade ago might not have left the cocoon of Bangkok's Khao San Road oasis venture to the Cambodian capital to stroll the riverfront near the iconic FCC, buy some handicrafts and practice the exotic Asian custom of sitting around drinking beer and talking about themselves.

I holiday in Cambodia the way some people holiday in Spain, or Miami. But this particular excursion had extras: I would be there over Xmas, and Cambodia is not particularly Xian, though they do like Santa Claus.

And I was meeting my pal The Monkey King, who's now working in Singapore and back in Asia where he belongs.

So I told him to meet me at the Nan Jing Hotel for Xmas Eve dim sum breakfast.


Now THIS is what I call festive.


Dumplings, sticky rice and tea.


Santas bust in to merry up our dim sum breakfast.


Check out the Khmer couple with their tyke, on a bike.


Yeah the fotos are outta focus but the kid is cute, so who cares.


Kite-vendor on the street: gotta be a big neon-colored manta ray to fly in the Khmer sky.


I love the anarchic energy of this shot: languid Khmers hangin' as the neon rays flap in the winter breeze.


Reflection of Kampuchea Krom Boulevard on the window of a parked vehicle.


Peeled poster on a lamppost, all that's left is the "OMG!" shriek of...delight?


Nine prohibited items on this sign, don't even THINK about 'em.


CamboNeon.


The Monkey King being mysterious in the Phnom Penh night.

Next day,I just have to foto the "dorkequins," starting with this plaster idiot:

Yes, it really is accessorized with a bag shaped like a giant camouflage sneaker.


The dork at left lost his head but kept his giant spiked backpack. His pal at right urges us to "Be Trendy," and has proved his hipness by spurning everyday tattoos/piercing in favor of finger-amputations...dude! You're so cool!


Add a hoodie covered with cartoon characters: instant doofus!


Porkpie hats are "in" this winter.


These moto-powered rickshaws aren't a bad way to get around, and they advertise groovy products like...this "310" stuff.


The traffic in the Phnom never ceases to amuse.


Khmer entrepreneurship at its finest: brightly colored fruit stall attached to a moto.


I love the stalls selling roasted piglets, and TMK obliged by snapping a few pix of me with the crispy treats.


These here pigs are de finest!


Nokia was having a promo featuring Santas handing out balloons.


And yes, KFC is open and dishing out fried chicken while road improvements continue just outside.


And the refurbished Lux cinema is showing its Xmastime blockbuster: some Thai horror, full-on chickenheaded transplant at the Xmas Dinner From Hell...I have no idea really.


The Phnom has many terrific Vietnamese and Chinese eateries, including my fave Northeast Dumpling whose owner thinks I'm great although I can't understand a word she says. But after a couple of days of Asian food, we decided to try a pie at The Pizza Company, a Thai company that's opened a couple of branches in the Cambo capital. Monkey King gets ready to shark out on a slice of finest Khmer 'za.

It was great to see him and chill out for a few days. Then it was back to Hong Kong and back to work...

I brought my scuba gear and went out to Ko Haa one day. Ko Haa is five limestone outcrops that rise above sea level a few dozen klicks west of Ko Lanta. I first dove Koh Haa in January 1993--things were different back then.

View from the dive boat.

Koh Haa sea/landscape.

I was fortunate to have one of the divemasters as dive-buddy: young American guy named Sumner. He was great.


Sumner geared up for the abyss.

Not so great: the visibility. Weather in the region was abnormal this winter: during our visit, we got strong winds at times and choppy seas. This made things cool and comfy ashore, but made water-activities less than ideal. Normally you get 15-20 meters visibility off Lanta in water, but on my dive-day, it was more like five meter. This works for a fun-dive, but...less than ideal, and decidely odd—the divemasters said they'd never seen such conditions.

Anyway, down we went.


Sumner gives me the "OK" sign. Yeah I'm OK buddy, let's look at some fish and stuff.


Blizzard o' fish.


Purple and green: big anemone.


A boxfish the size of a rugby ball. Usually they're skittish, but this one was having its gills cleaned by cleaner-wrasse fish—one of the ocean's symbiotic relationships.


Closeup of the gill-cleansing: you can see the dull-burgundy-colored gill and a wrasse or two.


The obligatory moray eel, a red one...shame about the sediment in the water reflecting the flash.


These fish are such a bright yellow I call 'em "lemonfish." They're shy and my pix of these guys are always of them from the tail-side...


Big blue starfish.


Triggerfish, the size of an American football. When they're nesting, they get territorial and aggressive: they're the only fish that will rush you to protect their turf. That's what I've heard anyway...I've never been jumped by a trigger (they don't bite but they'll bump you, best to keep clear. This fellow though was just grazing, while his pal hangs around waiting for leftovers.


Some yellow gar-type o' fish that just hung around upside down.


Yellow gar chillin', imagining life as a squid, or whatever's running through its tiny brain.


Red fish, green coral.

Surface-interval...rehydrate, off-gass nitrogen and snarf down some lunch.


One of the islands and another dive-boat, as seen from our boat.


Rear of the boat, divin' guys hanging out.

Back down into Poseidon's backyard.


Sea fans, which are living coral, and some pretty little fish.


Nice combo of electric-blue and yellow on this guy.

One of the outcrops is hollow inside and you can surface in an underwater cave. It's not open at the top so the only light filters up from the sea outside.


This obscure shot is the cave-entrance. You swim under, then up, looking for your bubbles breaking on the surface as you slowly ascend, keeping your hand above your head. Yes, it's bizarre.

It's spooky in there and exciting—you'd need powerful lights to get much of an image. Sumner flashed a shot of me hanging onto a volcanic rock.


Yeah, I know I look like a dork. OK, you surface in an underwater cavern and see how easy it is to hold a glam-slam pose while treading water in the volcanic gloom.

After this we chit-chatted a bit while floating around in there. The thing about scuba-diving is that you are wearing devices that affect your buoyancy: a belt with lead-weights to reduce it, and a BCD (Buoyancy Control Device) which can be filled with air from your compressed-air tank, so when you want to float around on the surface, you simply hit the button and inflate it. So if you want to shoot the breeze while floating around some ethereal bluegreenlit-from-beneath sepulchral chamber created by a volcanic belch many moons ago, you jack some air into your BC and relax. Sumner looked upwards and mused aloud: "No human has ever touched those walls."

We re-descended, exited the cavern and finished the dive. Cruised back in for:


Another wicked sunset, this one snapped from Rico's porch.

A couple of shots left over from The Island:


Driftwood on the beach.


Rockwaterscape.


Rico, majorly stressed, roasting a Bolivar belicoso.

Happy New Year everyone! We'll get to those scuba-fishies, but first, flashback to mid-December...

'Twas time for our annual Questex Xmas party. Certain traditions are upheld, like the "silly gift": you draw the name of a co-worker out of a hat and must buy them a gift, the only rule is that the price may NOT exceed HK$20 (about US$2.50). Often you draw the name of a co-worker you don't know well, so you've got to get creative, but the recipients aren't named. Gifts MUST be silly in nature.

Generally office-Xmas parties are a bore, but I have a lot of fun at the Questex variety. Hope you enjoy the fotos!

We've got a lot of employees now so a Hong Kong-style barbecue at a local sports club was on. I've seen 'em in movies, and I know the drill, but ironically, this was the first Hongkie BBQ I'd participated in.

There are protocols. A typical Hong Konger would find an American-style BBQ (with indirect heat, long cooking times, cold side dishes and a sense of order) peculiar.

OK, here's what you need:

You need a big ol' BBQ, either a concrete pit or in this case, half of a 55-gallon drum.


Yes, the stool is covered with tinfoil cuz it's gonna get messy later.

You need a stack of meter-long wooden-handled BBQ forks with two tines.


"Be careful—you could poke yer eye out with one of those!", your mother might yell. She's right.

You need stuff to spear on those medieval implements.

Members of Questex Media Asia inspect plastic tubs of spearables.


You need a BBQ-dude who gets the charcoal started.

Flamin' up! We're ready to get this party started.

Love the "BBQ" charcoal bag here.


Cannis and Candace have speared pieces of plain white bread and are toasting them cutely, CUTELY I say, over a (nonexistent) fire.


Teresa demonstrates a classic HKBBQ technique: brandishing speared tubes of meat-emulsion, ready for a-roastin'!


Get down!! The first things to hit the flames are hot dogs (the round things are fishballs) while everyone sits around sizzling theirs and chit-chatting in Cantonese.


Close-up of the mayhem. Some tinfoil-wrapped packages sit roasting in the pit, inside (individually): eggplant, mushrooms, sweet potatoes.


If your hotdog isn't charring quickly enough, you can always brush honey on it. Seriously. Hong Kong supermarts sell these jars of "barbecue honey" complete with disposable yellow plastic brush.


Someone wanted their tube-steaks fantastically charred.


The Michelin guide doesn't have enough stars to rate a banquet like this.


Once the flames die down a bit, people skewer marinated raw chicken wings and start sizzlin' those. And yes, people are still toasting white bread.


Ever mindful of culinary hygiene, Dick Wong wears a clingwrap-plastic glove to hold the raw chicken wing while he rams a BBQ fork into it.


It's chickentastic.


Folks at another BBQ went mainstream and put a grill on to cook corn, porkchops, lambchops, and yet more chicken wings and hotdogs.


Now this is sheer genius: Agnes our web designer brought Sara Lee pound cake, cut it into chunks and toasted it over the open fire.


All-Butter Sara Lee pound cake toasted right next to raw meat. The slab of beef at left was Teresa's concept. Innovation like this is what makes Hong Kong one of Asia's centers of excellence!


Agnes shows off a perfectly toasted cake chunk.


Aftermath...who needs linen napkins when you can rip off wads of industrial-grade bog-roll?!


Time to start getting silly.


The bowling teams were demarcated by brightly colored accessories. Here's Dick and Michelle modeling their outfits.


Yes folks, working-life in Asia really is different. Now, let's destroy some pins.


Jessie waits for her ball to return...


...and demonstrates how to bowl while wearing a fake hula skirt.


Yes, that's me, wearing my "Vito's Loans, Brooklyn" bowling shirt with its snarling shark logo, my size 15 orange/black bowling shoes and an absurd headdress, hurling a 13-pound bowling ball towards an array of helpless pins. Oh yeah, I picked up the spare...what, u kiddin'?!


Pauline gets ready to chuck an 8-pound lime-green ball down the lane.


Lookit them scores! Lookit them smiles! Lookit that hula skirt on Agnes, who's checking to make sure all her strikes are properly recorded.

I travel often enough that my scram-scramble's perennially staged-to-go: throw certain items in one pile and all the verboten liquid items in see-thru Ziploc-bag nonsense or, better yet, in a check-in bag. Still, I hate checking in luggage. I'll travel halfway around the world with a carry-on.

No choice here. My Xmas holiday in Thailand included aeroplaning down south to beaches and rocks and wooden bungalows, seeking the ultimate meld of comfort and Gilligan's Island goofiness. Fortunately, Xmas 08 included wingman and previous travel-buddy RicoFlan, who's a superb travel companion as long as no one commits errors like serving strawberry jam for brekk. Which of course is gonna happen...there's no way Thailand is suddenly going to come unstuck from its blissful state of pseudocompliance with international standards or even minimal competence, there will be mistakes aplenty, everyone knows this, mai pen rai and damn the squid-torpedoes. Rico's solution: bring multiple tiny jars of fabulous Balinese jam and lime-marmalade. Some had ginger and there was, wait for it, GINGER lime-marmalade...as ambrosial as it sounds.

Fortunately, the Big Mistake (the airport whoopee-party) has been rectified and planes are now allowed to land at Bangkok's Cobra Swamp Errport—it's called Suwannapoom although there's an official spelling, something like Sublimebarmysalami or similar nonsense, ignore that and just say "Suwannapoom." And now there's a new "Prime Minister" which means...

Nothing. The Thai economy's been partially insulated from foreign investment since the '06 coup—this, combined with the compliance-initiatives forced onto Thai banks after 1997, when the country was attempting to maintain a US$ currency-peg without adequate reserves (until the scheme imploded), now keeps the baht relatively steady at 33-35/US$, while most other currencies gyrate. However, in the current global climate, discretionary spending like fun-travel is pared off like rind, and the airport-closure, which affected all flights to/from/transiting-through Bangkok, is Drano-in-the-veins for Thai tourism and international business. You can read my Computerworld Hong Kong editorial on HK's response: "Thai crisis bites approval rating of Hong Kong govt officials" (http://www.cw.com.hk/article.php?type=article&id_article=2838).

For us, it was a plus. Bangkok sidewalks, bungalow operations, airports—tourist spots—was magnificently uncrowded in high season. While we'd spent weeks wondering if we'd even get to the country, once jets were jettin', it was cake. I flew into Cobra Swamp, collected my bright yellow scuba bag with my wetsuit and other gear rolled inside, and rocked up at the taxi queue—one other tourist was in line while the taxi DRIVERS, for a change, queued up hoping for a fare. Irony, sweet as revenge. Best served cold.

Stayed at a service-apartment hotel on Soi 11 (with gym), near the apartment-building that housed me in 2003-04, and while many of the 'hood's plusses (like the cart that sells ferocious gafae boran (old-school Thai coffee) in ten baht plastic bags remain, the dearth of turistas was refreshing. We checked our favorite Middle Eastern eatery for a monster dose of hummous, grilled chicken skewers, salad, etc. While the Scala, my favorite Bangkok cinema, was showing the remake of THE DAY THE EARTH STOOD STILL (1951....what WON'T H'wood remake?!), we skipped it in favor of strolling Bangkok's cool/comfy streets.

Next day it's time to pick up stuff for The Island, because we are slipping into the land of sand and hermit crabs and saltwater and sun and the land of no-connectivity. That said, my prepaid Thai mobile-phone SIM can now use EDGE (GPRS) technology and connect to the Net—it's not blazing fast but worked for email and simple newsreader-apps on my iPhone.

Of course we head for MBK, where you can buy Just About Anything. There's other malls nearby with alternatives, but MBK is the original mack-daddy retail-blaster in town and just check out those furniture shops on the fifth floor.

Later, a massive dinner at our favorite Korean place. People may find it odd that some of my favorite Bangkok eateries are Iraqi and Korean, but the best Thai food in Bangkok is usually at no-name street-stalls, although Yong Lee on Sukhumvit Soi 15 is sublime Sino-Thai fusion boran. Anyway, we snarfed up piles of grilled pork ribs, squadrons of side-dishes and enough kimchi to wipe out a platoon of Draculas.

Time for the flight to Krabi, and we're met at the airport by a minivan. Cruising the highways of southern Thailand, Rico wants to stop at an ATM and I want some water and snacks. A local shop sells Thai-style-Chinese dumplings with soy/vinegar sauce, great. But when I get back to the van, a local cop (in full helmet/too-tight brown uniform drag) is haranguing our van-driver. Apparently he parked where we shouldn't, but our real transgression is being foreigners-on-wheels in a place where added-revenue-options for the authorities are now limited, as the doggone foreigners just aren't pouring into the airport, imagine that.

So we have to drive to the cop-shop. This isn't good because the fewer people you involve in impromptu-cozzer-contributions, the better (let me clarify: you're making a contribution to the policemen's costume-ball, and the more that goes into the initial flatfoot's pocket, the quicker you resolve, the fewer the palms requiring grease). But we're at the no-name siren-barn with big "POLICE" vans parked on the lawn.

The driver disappears, then reappears with a sheet of paper. The number "400"—and nothing else—had been written on it. OK, that's about six bucks apiece, we can survive, we pony up the cash and head out of there. Leverage our legal-eagle adventure by stopping at a local gai yaang/som tam cart for more yummy snacks: that's spiced grilled chicken on bamboo skewers, and blazing-hot green papaya salad, good stuff, and continued to The Island.

Narima is a nice operation: renewable materials, comfortable and sturdy bungalows with porches, ceiling fans + air-con units which is the best combination for the tropics, and enough space to ensure a fine cushion of privacy and quiet.


My bungalow's porch.

Narima was surprisingly full given the recent airport-woes, and while some guests brought their kids, there was little aggro. Best of all, the food at the restaurant was good and we seldom ate anywhere else.

I'm not going to give daily breakdowns—the idea of a holiday like this is you just slow down, chill out and let days dissolve into one another. My first night, I slept ten straight hours, and after that, I was well In The Zone. Rico and I have traveled to beach-destinations together, and we're simpatico in terms of activity versus chill, meaning we were either doing something, or doing NOTHING, the latter consisting of hanging out chit-chatting and listening to interesting music on Rico's balcony (he had the ocean-view and the iPod-driven hi-fi).

Activities: brisk beach-walking:


Rocks/sand/cliff-of-greenery/Rico.


Fisherman and longtail boats.


Rico on the rocks.


Reflecting pool.

Jungle-walking:

The road.


The stream.


The...abandoned hut of the Andaman Sea's version of the Sawney Beane family no doubt.

Renting motorscooters (mine drove like a lawnmower but I grew to like it) and went ripping around the asphalt roads...well, mostly asphalt, some were dirt 'n' rock.


This tyke, daughter of a pleasant Muslim travel agent who arranged our longtail charter, was a bit leery of me and Rico cuz we're big farang-type guys. But she thought my lawnmower-bike was fabuki !!

Went to:

A rubber-tree plantation.


Drip, sap, drip—aspire to become a tire.


The rubber-tappers shed. Dig the Izlamik talisman above the door and the bovine skulls. I wouldn't be knocking if I was an Amway salesman or a proselytizing Jehovah's witness.


The skulls: a classy addendum to this pied-a-terre.

Road sights:

Bewildered tourists. Notice the extremely intelligent choice of motorbikin' apparel: shorts and flip-flops. Even a minor spill and they'll be canceling their avocado/lemongrass skin-rubs.


Rico's not bewildered: why, there's a longtail boat flying outta the scrub with a sign explaining everything in Thai attached to it. Clear as red mud!


Bull elephant snacking on foliage. If you look closely at the saddle, you can see the owner's foot on the armrest—yes, he's sound asleep. Thais can sleep ANYwhere.


Fortunately, Ko Lanta has wide beaches and largely escaped the wrath of the 2004 tsunami (my pal The Mastermind was headed to Phuket at that time but changed his plans to Lanta at my urging, thus saving his life and you figure he'd email me every once in awhile, but naaah, he's too busy). Still, you've got to wonder about the efficacy of this graphic. If monster waves manifest, flee. OK, got it.


Vroom into your bungalow-op after a hard day of playing Road King on Lanta's asphalt arteries and check the scene: Khun Kwan (one of the more competent employees) cuddling up to a vast pachyderm. Out here in nature, elephants have a chance to get the 200 kilograms of food they need daily. In Bangkok, although it's illegal, people parade elephants around on the hard asphalt, trying to sell bags of food to tourists. The animals are slowly starving, so their pimps allegedly dose them with appetite-supressing stimulants...the combo of hunger, urban overstimulation and pachyderm-meth, unsurprisingly, sometimes drives the poor beasts over the brink and they go berserk, smashing tourists and locals alike. The Thai attitude toward this seems to be to make the practice double-extra-illegal, or something. If you see elephants paraded around Bangkok, glare at their pimps and tell them "put the animals back in the forest, where they belong." That's what I do.


The obligatory sunset shot.

Next entry: scuba-duba!

The Xmas lights glimmer across Victoria Harbour from Kowloonside. Some crew of young'uns is doing a fashion shoot out here, out at the North Point Outdoor Cinema, six seats, no popcorn, a wall of slick graffiti as backdrop. Their strobe-flashes pop to my left, cutting the yellow sodium-vapor streetlights. I was able to capture that look in my most recent shots by cranking the digital ISO to 400 and trying to hold still. I'd like a better camera.

Not in the budget. My budget's been cut to bare essentials—things I might normally consider affordable, now ain't. Ironically, I'm flying to Bangkok on Saturday for Xmas holiday, but it's something that was planned and booked (and paid for) months ago. I'm meeting my pal Rico Flan and heading down south to Ko Lanta for some quality chillout time. Canceling and seeking refunds was an option, but as Rico is good-to-go and I have a reasonable expectation of successful transport (short-haul flight on the national carrier, enough lead time to evacuate most of the stranded tourists).

Roll that around the ol' noggin for awhile: "evacuate the tourists." Of course, all air travel to/from Bangkok was suspended for over a week, and the insane level of self-damage Thailand has managed to accomplish THIS time is incalculable. It's odd to have a beach holiday booked and feel ambivalent—few things are as serene as the Andaman Sea in winter, and we're assured of uncrowded conditions—in sharp contrast to the last time I visited Lanta (last Xmas).

In chilly Hong Kong, where I live and work, there are no yets. I'm hitting the road and hope to regain stride and grace. This week is for tying up loose-ends, packing my wetsuit and other essentials and flying into the Cobra Swamp airport, recently occupied by a bunch of...

Well you probably read about it. But if you didn't read the most recent Economist articles...well you're probably not concerned about Thailand anyway. Were Rico and I to cancel our plans, we'd be joining the growing legions who are crossing the tropical nation off their vacation-list.

Hong Kong news was dominated by Thailand last week, largely because the HK government initially declined to charter airplanes to fly its citizens out. The Macau SAR chartered planes, the mainland did as well—they went into evacuation-mode. Hong Kong, citing a lack of bloodshed, did not. A laissez-faire move which, with 20/20 hindsight, nailed the "fail" button.

Fate turned the ace of spades: a minivan carrying stranded tourists from Bangkok to Phuket (where Hong Kong's Dragonair had scheduled extra flights for evac) crashed enroute. Among the casualties was a young pair of Hong Kong citizens: the woman made it, the man didn't. Immediately after this incident the HK government began operating charter flights, some to the beleaguered U-Tapao airbase: a former US military airbase in Sattahip, near Pattaya on the eastern seaboard.

Too little/too late for public opinion, which has been loud and vitriolic. At first the govt tried to stick Secretary for Security Ambrose Lee with the blame, but before long, Financial Secretary Henry Tang (this post is generally considered #2 in the HK govt executive branch) was out there apologizing. No one will resign over this, but it's not gone down well with the HK public, who often take holidays in Thailand.

Or did, anyway. The past tense is going to be used more often in talking about The Kingdom of Siam in the months and years ahead. If you're interested you should be reading The Economist, the BBC site, Asia Times (atol.com), the IHT, even AP and Bloomberg. Things which would never be published even a month ago are now a matter of record on reputable media. You either get me, or you don't.

Anyway, I'm off soon, and hope to be able to post an entry or two from the road. Holiday-season, let's party, people!

Urban space is tight in Hong Kong. Renovating a 20-story building jammed into one of HK's city-blocks isn't a simple process.

Look at your wrist. Now imagine a bamboo pole of that thickness, and the length of an apartment building. Now imagine piles of these poles.

These are the building blocks of the lattice-work Hong Kong workers use as scaffolding—lashed together with black plastic ties and rising over the top of the building. Yes, it's natural bamboo, dried/flexible/strong. The bamboo grid is augmented by green netting to contain rough debris.

The construction-guys trust their lives to this structure. They clamber upon it, peeling off the late-70s tiling, constructing new drainage infrastructure and, recently, painting the building (the renovation of Cheong Shing Mansion has been ongoing for months). The boys swear it's safer than steel scaffolding, and there are few incidents of bamboo-guys falling off. The scaffolding can collapse during typhoons, but the stuff outside my windows, while it does mutate the view I infrequently admire, has withstood a couple of serious storms.

Renovation of the "mansion" includes jackhammering the bare concrete of the fire stairs and installing tile, which is nice, and new lift-controls. I haven't taken photos until today, when I came home from work and found they'd jackhammered the floor/walls/ceiling of the building lobby. That's Hong Kong for ya: while you're at the office, guys turn your everyday environment into an art space. Check it out:


Eat yer heart out, you New York gallery-owners, ye minions of minimalism!


"Untitled" (2008), by the Cheong Shing Jackhammer Art Kollektiv. Private collection, not for sale.


Nothing like this at the Bangkok Airport. Do NOT get me started on that verdamnt situation...


It's odd when you go into your kitchen for coffee on a Saturday morning and find someone perched literally outside your window, a hundred meters or so above the sidewalk.


Lift is the British word for elevator. One syllable or four, take yer pick.


It looks like the entire lift-controller is hanging loose and held on by some brown cloth tape. It is.


Jackhammer all facades for inner peace!


All elektrix must tangle!!


The newly renovated "cinema"...it's pretty spiffy now.


Other side of the "cinema": HK skyline peeking over the concrete wall.


I told you that shop sold roasted pigface. HK$10 (about a buck-and-and-a-quarter).


Xmas lights Kowloonside, across Victoria Harbour. Getting to be About That Time...

Well of course wedding banquets aren't normal meals. I was planning to write about the "ghost char chaa teng"—a basic "greasy chopstick" dish-'em-out eatery that makes a wicked beef hor fun—but then the GCCT went and screwed up Chee's "Singapore noodle."

Naturally, your typical HK CCT Sing-noodle doesn't resemble anything you'd get in Singapore, but sometimes you want one, and not something else. So when Chee opened his ricepod and found, I dunno what, he swore a mighty oath and went back to the GCCT and had them re-do it. And this is a guy who speaks fluent Cantonese, and repeated his order more than once. So the GCCT gets marked down. Maybe I'll blog about it later, maybe I won't (it's not that photogenic).

We still go there, but they can't even get the chili sauce takeaway-packets right, and how are you gonna eat an HK CCT beef hor fun without chili sauce? Their lack of competence in condiments drove Teresa and me semi-batso one day and she went off to the local market and bought a bottle of chili sauce—we keep it in the fridge so we can chilify the GCCT ricepods.

I digress. Our associate publisher Simon got married last Friday, at a hotel in Tsim Sha Tsui East, and virtually the entire office attended. I was running late and it was unseasonably warm/humid for mid-November, so I got a bit sweaty when walking to the place and arrived late—stopped at the reception desk and before they could even tell me my assigned table, I heard the booming voice of Dick Wong at the microphone: "Stefan, please come to the stage immediately." The entire work crew is up there having their photo taken. I walk up, say hi to the bride (hadn't met her before—lovely woman named Rity), pose, flash flash and then go sit at table 11.

Hong Kong Chinese-style wedding banquets aren't everyday fare, but they're formulaic. Instead of giving possibly-useful stuff like blenders or espresso-makers, guests give definitely-useful envelopes of cash (the "red packet," and I've learned a few things about red-packet-etiquette over the years, so if you're interested, drop me an email or add a comment and I'll expound).

The early hours, when grandmas and kids are likely to stop by, are typified by impromptu mahjong games. Entertainment ranges from multimedia presentations with vintage snaps of the newly married, often with additions or commentary. Emcees may give jocular discourses on their quirks (all in Cantonese of course, but Simon & Rity's emcees were professional and well received).

The Questex crew did some impromptu foto-shoot'n:


Top row: Edmund our new Webmaster, Jonathan Bigelow (the Big Boss, who replaced Rob), Angela, Candace and most of Agnes. Bottom: Me, and much of Dick the Wonga.


Edmund, Angela, Jonathan, me, Candace, Agnes...me and Dick. The "pistol-L" gesture is one I use a lot but ironically am NOT doing in this shot: it's a face-frame thing, very Asian, good for a quick laugh. Don't ask me what gesture Dick is attempting. He's like that ALL the time, believe me. There was funnier stuff too but I couldn't foto everything.


It goes without saying that every Chinese wedding banquet starts with an immaculately disassembled roast piglet.


Roast pigface. A shop down my block sells them, and for awhile I thought of having a Halloween party, buying a few and making some party-altars. But my flat's dinky and inviting-people-over just isn't a Hong Kong type-of-thing.


Rectangles of roasted piglet. They're crispy, greasy and yummy: sort of the ultimate medieval bacon rind, except processed "bacon rinds" taste like desiccated air-puffed kerfuffledoodle and these delectable morsels taste like essence of pig.


Chee models the pig-rectangles but needless to say, they didn't last long.


Angela salutes the piglet while Agnes snaps away with her Canon and Dick pretends he's not wearing an Italian-restaurant-tablecloth and yaks on his mobile.


Angela and Agnes: could they possibly be any cuter?!


Yes.


Food (abalone and veg).


Connie and Kitty!


More food (broccoli is sai lan fah in Cantonese in case you were wondering).


Angela's shoes—this shot was taken at the office earlier, and yes, she wears stuff like this often.


More food (scallop/squid/green bean thing).


"Come on Agnes, just eat it, errr, OK, Angela..."


More food (whole fish steamed with soy/ginger/onion).


The fish head, with fin-garnishes (you knew this was coming).


Fruit attack! Teresa makes like a psychokiller with the fork while Allie looks on and our office manager Rebecca gives the "oh those wacky kids" glance.


Folks at our table were absolutely stuffed but co-workers at the other table, pragmatically, swiped our fruit platters—the platters at lower left have small ball-shaped sweets, one's a sort of custard-filled pastry and the other is a sesame ball filled with lotus paste. Or something like that. Delicious but after nine courses...Pauline is assaulting the fruit while Cannis finds the whole thing highly amusing.

A good time was had by all, and Simon & Rity are off on a one-week honeymoon in Japan.

Author Tim Hallinan has a great blog-comment-thread going on over at http://www.timothyhallinan.com/blog/?p=233. He wondered who should perform at Obama's inaugural ball and spawned a fascinating string of comments and speculation. Of course I weighed in with my choices, kinda heavy on the Mo-Stax, give me Martha Reeves or Mavis Staples over some dingbat wearing a baseball cap incorrectly and gesticulating over material possessions.

I recall the bewilderment of Dubya's inaugural in January 2001—pundits suggested that cowboy boots and Stetsons would be trendy. But like everything from "My Pet Goat" to his recent faux-congrats to the President-elect, 'twas naught but a crock of Bush dung. Spoonfed by the media, folks back then attributed good-ol'-Texan characteristics to Dubya. The jury was still out on the Bush Junior.

Not any more. Sludgebucket's currently running an approval level of less than 20%, lower than any president in history (but still higher than those sudden weird headaches that crop up when you drink a milkshake too fast). The twerp is making Nixon look like FDR. January 20 is starting to look like the 4th of July.

So who should perform for Obama? Someone suggested ZZ Top, and I like that. There's something about ZZT that represents my America: a place where people work hard, pay their debts and can find Mexico on a map. The growls and squeals of Billy Gibbons's guitar work as soundtrack to red dust flying off a beaten '77 Dodge pickup truck on the way to the drive-in cinema, that's the America I know. A place where people say: "Hang on just a second there, champ, just what is IN this thing you call 'The Patriot Act'? You best not be stepping on our civil liberties, because as you know, liberty IS civil."

Still, if I were granted Godlike powers for a moment (now there's a scary thought, but...just this once), I know who I'd put on that stage. I'd reach back into 1967 and call forth: Otis Redding. Backed by...well, do you need to ask? Guys named Steve and Booker T and Donald "Duck" Dunn. Turtlenecks, straight-leg pants, Beatle-boots, and Kustom amps, turned to an appropriate Big-Deal-Wash-DeeCee volume.



Redding would never have made it in the MTV/American Idol world. His earnest but horse-faced mug wasn't made for the living-room glow of the Haunted Fish Tank.



But oh could he sing, the power of black American gospel fused with barely controlled blasts of ball-lightning, mythic yet real simultaneous, it seemed at times as though his body could barely contain it. Listen to his cover of Sam Cooke's "Shake"—recorded live—where at times the microphone seems to be trying to dodge bullets as the crowd fires back. Although best known for his plaintive hit "Sitting on the Dock of the Bay," Redding's too-short oeuvre is a mix of body-shots, jabs and show-stopper uppercuts. Of all the great Stax-Volt acts, only the wicked Wilson Pickett approached the ferocity of Otis (not to diss Aretha, Sam & Dave and Rufus/Carla Thomas: they too are part of My America, and I've got a double-sawbuck that says Dubya couldn't name a single Stax-Volt title).

Well heck, as long as I'm playing Master of the Inaugural, let's bring Pickett out for a few numbers. Imagine Barack and Michelle shaking it to "Land of 100 Dances."



Hey Tim, this is fun, thanks again!

Here's a bit of Otis Redding trivia: if you've ever wondered why his reading of "Satisfaction" is so transcendent and eccentric, here it comes. Although the Rolling Stones original was a huge worldwide hit...

Otis had never heard it. Someone gave him the sheet-lyrics, Cropper cranked the riff and Redding just...sang it the way it seemed right to him. Who knows who came up with the horn parts, including that wicked baritone-sax bellow...Cropper basically lived in the Stax-Volt studio during those days, so he probably knows. But covering a pop hit you've never heard, from a culture an ocean away...about the only things that Redding and Jagger/Richards ever had in common were a love of the blues and knowing what it means to be poor and live on either Grandma's cooking or pork pies (respectively).

And yes: the election of Barack Obama has, even from my tiny vantage point on this rock in the South China Sea, changed the status of the USA in the world's eyes. As he said when discussing his choice of family dog: "a mutt like me," and while purebreds may lounge around waiting for their daily shampoo and freshly scrambled eggs, mutts roll up their sleeves and get to work. Obama has a hell of a lot of work to do, and while we're all pitching in and practicing fiscal conservatism (financing that new bling-bling SUV not so attractive now, eh?), there's no reason why he can't kick off his presidency with a feisty celebration. Put your hand, on your hip, c'mon. And let your backbone slip.

Shake.