If I had an extra day in a week. . .

I learned today that it would probably be spent reading, for that is what I did all day. Well, after a late morning run, I spent an entire day reading a novel, Ruth Ozeki's My Year of Meats. I took some time off to cook dinner and talk to my mom and do a little cleaning, but otherwise, I spent the bulk of the day reading this three hundred-sixty-something page novel.

This novel was initially recommended to me several years ago by a Sinologist. I used to see him almost daily at my old job. I was reading Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation at the time, and he was reading this Ozeki novel, so we often started the day comparing our books, exchanging tidbits about other interesting reads, lamenting foreign policy/politics, or discussing classical music (he was a fellow lapsed violinist), and of course talking about his new dog, Goldie.

We agreed to swap books when we were done reading our respective books, but this never happened.
He passed away last summer. Several months ago, I found the book on display at the Stanford Bookstore and bought it, thinking of him. Today, I cracked it open, intending to read for just a few hours before moving on to my Hungarian studies. At this rate I will never learn Hungarian. . . but back to this book.

At first, the stereotypes bothered me-- the sleazy Japanese businessmen always drunk and sketchy, etc., but as I read further on, these stereotypes took on a more ancillary role, giving way to the meat and substance (ok, bad pun intended. . . I couldn't help myself.) of the novel. It was a fascinating story about a documentarian who works for a Japanese T.V. station and looks for stories about quintessentially American families eating meat. I found the first part of the novel a bit hokey--the quotes from Sei Shonagon, the documentarian/narrator's idealism of bridging cultures, etc., but as the novel progressed, there was another story unfolding about the meat industry, its use of hormones, antibiotics, steroids, etc. It was this part that kept me captivated. I have read about the unscrupulous practices of meat slaughterhouses before, but it is always disturbing to read them again.

Essentially, it was a fiction version of Schlosser's Fast Food Nation or Upton Sinclair's The Jungle with a modern twist. It was very cleverly done and compelling. This got me thinking. Given its medium, I wondered if it raked up controversy when it was published in 1998. I remember Schlosser's book stirring much controversy when it came out in 2002. It seemed like everyone was quoting him or reading him or making reference to him. This novel, My Year of Meats actually predated his book by four years. Yet, I don't remember this book being discussed nearly as much. In fact, I have heard about it from many people, including my late Sinologist friend, but only after Schlosser's book came out.

Does its fiction genre abate its controversial nature? I'm not sure what I mean by this, but I sometimes get annoyed at documentaries for being too in your face. This wasn't the case for Fast Food Nation, but I often react this way to Michael Moore's documentaries and reacted this way to Super-size Me. Yet, this in-your-faceness stirs outrage and other emotions in people, drives people to action, and before we know it, we have companies like McDonald's announcing the elimination of their super sizes. So despite my artistic preference for nuance and subtlety, this in your face-ness thing works.

Now comes this work of fiction, essentially covering the same controversial topics, but it's almost as if it gets away with being a bit "preachy", b/c its genre makes the controversy and preachiness secondary--that is, we have this misconception of fiction as primarily meant to entertain. Or maybe not so much "entertain" as people think of fiction as not being factual. It's hard to tell what parts are fiction, and what parts are fact. The author issues a disclaimer at the beginning of her book emphasizing that this book is fiction, yet, lists a bibliography for further reading. Interestingly, and probably intentionally, the bibliography is listed by the narrator of this book, and thus, is still part of the "fictional" novel, rather than the author presenting the bibliography at the end of her book as a reference. But again, had the bibliography been presented in this latter manner, it would've been a clear indication of the author suggesting further readings to the interested reader. However, Ozeki makes the character Jane present the bibliography which blurs her intentions. Perhaps I'm reading too much into this.

I can't make up my mind whether her novel was more effective because of this, or whether this infusion of didacticism caused the story to seem more contrived.

Kayaking in San Francisco

A friend was turning 25, so to celebrate, my friend E organized a night time guided kayaking tour of the SF Bay. The tour was put on by SF Kayak.

All day at work, as I was obsessively checking the weather reports and indignantly noting the increasing cold and winds, I must admit that I was getting less and less enthusiastic about going. However, 4:00 came, and it was time to drive up.

Of the ten of us that did this, four of us motored up together, including the birthday boy.

He had no idea what we were doing. All he was told was to bring a fleece and a ski cap. We parked at Pier 38, and walked along the dock. While we were being blasted by the cold wind, my friend, girlfriend of said boy and organizer of this clandestine conspiracy plan asked him to guess what we were doing. Peering at the row of kayaks, he said, "Well, it can't be kayaking, because a) C (other person in our carpool, who in this case ended up serving as a "decoy") is with us and she's not into activities like that, and b) I'd be pissed." We managed to keep a straight face for about 3 seconds before we all started rolling over with laughter.

So kayaking it was. The outing started a little past 8 p.m. After being outfitted with high-tech waterproof stuff, signing waiver forms and being coached on the fine art of paddling without acquiring blisters, we started out at pier 38 and practiced our strokes, turns, etc. for a bit. Most of us (myself included) were beginners. Once we were all comfortable with our paddles, we set out towards the bay to behind Pac Bell Stadium. Decoy girl and I were paddling partners. For someone who has a reputation for being "not into activities like that", she was a great paddler.

Although this was just a "special outing" for most of us, I was surprised at how many sea tailgating "regulars" there were--some dressed up, some sporting SF Giants attire, some with long nets eagerly awaiting for that stray homerun ball, some with elaborate picnics, some with their supply of narcotics--all having a blast. After perching out for a while here and enjoying the spectacle, the people-watching, and resting, we ventured on under the pier to a quieter area.

The journey under the pier was itself an adventure. It felt like we were in a scene from some suspense thriller, undertaking some surreptitious plan. Well, other than the fact that we were all saying "cool!", it had the right ambience: dark, narrow space, murky calm waters, muffled sounds, etc.

After we got through the pier, we paddled around for a bit, went under some more low structures, and then eventually ended back behind Pac Bell park. By the time we returned, the number of sea tailgaters had dwindled--perhaps because of the score (9-0 with Giants leading at the time), and perhaps because of the drop in temperatures. The noise emanating from the stadium was as vibrant as ever.

Our organizers provided us with box dinners. I normally don't get too excited by tomato and avocado sandwiches, but given the odd setting, the ambience, the crowd, our hunger factor, etc., it could've easily been the best sandwich I've ever tasted. They even supplied us with champagne. Again, normally not something I like, but how often do you get to toast champagne in kayaks in the dark with 15 other people during a ball game?

Around the time that a nice little buzz was kicking in for me, the fireworks started. By this time, I was quite cold (my waterproof mitts were completely drenched. . .), but it turned out to be well worth the wait. Quality-wise, I've seen better fireworks in Japan, but this was probably the most dramatic show I've ever seen. The fireworks were being shot from a boat in the harbor, so we had the best seats. Plus decoy-girl and I somehow managed to drift very close to the boat, to the point where several times, the fireworks felt so close that I found myself yelling and paddling backwards for fear of the fireworks falling on us! Or at least, that is how close it seemed, which made for a thrilling and exhilarating effect.

It's hard to tell how long the fireworks lasted, but my guess is about 15-20 minutes. By the time we paddled back on shore, it was past 11 p.m. Decoy girl and I managed to get ourselves wet when we climbed out of our skirts, so we were quite cold!

We concluded the evening with rich warm hot cocoa at Giradhelli Square. A perfect end to an adventurous evening.

At the end of the evening, we asked the birthday boy if he was still pissed. He laughed. We took that to mean no. We were all exhausted, but all had a fantastic time.

Some more pictures are posted here. (Password is my name in all lowercase.)

I Love Cherries

Cherries are finally in season! Hurray! Now that apples are about to go out of season, I need other easy, colorful and yummy things to make with seasonal ingredients. This cherry crostini recipe fits the bill.

This cherry crostini takes about 20 minutes to assemble (maybe more--I cheated, b/c I already had the cream cheese made and the watercress washed and chopped up), and 5 minutes to eat, but is fully worth it. It is a winning recipe from one of our iron chef parties.

Need:
spreadable cream cheese (low or fully fat)
dill
finely chopped walnuts
thinly sliced slightly stale (or toasted) baguette
watercress
chopped cherries

You mix the cream cheese with dill and walnuts (to taste), then spread a thin layer of this over the slightly stale baguette, then put watercress on top, and then top with cherries. I used brooks cherries in this photo, but you can use any kind, really. I also like them with rainiers. Make sure you admire the vibrant colors before you eat. Oh, and if you're a slob like me, make sure you are not wearing white when you eat this.

It probably sounds weird to combine dill with cherries, but I found that the combination of the strongly flavored dill, the nutty walnuts, the bitter watercress and the sweet cherries works really well.

Bon appetit!

Contemplating Eve's Apple

Whilst eating my favorite snack in the world, I wondered what kind of apple Eve bit into.

I am convinced it must've been a Pink Lady. It is the quintessential apple, with beautiful (almost fluorescent) hues that just tempt you to bite into it. It has the perfect combination of sweet and tart. It is always the perfect texture; I have never had a mealy one. It tastes exactly the way one would imagine a perfect apple to taste. It is the epitome of apple-ness. (If one can epitomize such a thing.)

I also wondered whether Eve ate the apple by itself, or whether she had the option of eating it with almond butter.

While the Pink Lady apple sans condiments is an already fine stand-alone product, Pink Lady with crunchy almond butter is a divine combination. I can't think of a more perfect combination. Except maybe aged gouda and very good bread. . ..

I can't imagine ever getting sick of this combo. I bring it to work, to Opera in the Park, to parties, and even as a treat on long airplane flights. It is my default lunch when I can't think of anything else (as was the case today).

The apple has to be a Pink Lady--Fujis are too sweet, as are Jonagolds, and any other apple. The Granny Smith might work, b/c of its tartness.

And it has to be Full Belly Farm brand crunchy almond butter, which you can only get at the local farmer's market. (Did I mention it has to be the crunchy stuff? Oddly, when it comes to peanut butter, I've always liked the creamy stuff, but trust me on this--for this almond butter, get the crunchy stuff.)

Well, ok, it doesn't have to be--I'm sure there are other equally worthy almond or alternative nut butters out there that will do the job, and other perfectly fine apples. A Fuji apple w/ Trader Joe's almond butter is also pretty good, but the Pink Lady/Full Belly Farm crunchy almond butter combo is just out of this world.

Thankfully, the local farmer's market is back in business, since I'm almost out of my almond butter.
(Though unfortunately, the apple season is coming to an end. )

Post-concert Musings

I'm listening to Borodin (a wonderful composer whose virtues I'll extoll in a future posting) while writing this post. It is very moving modern music--oh, but I said I wouldn't talk about Borodin. . ..

So instead I will use this space to talk about my choral concert and pat ourselves on our back for doing such an awesome job. I feel a bit funny patting our own backs, but a) this is my blog, so I should be able to do what I want, and b) I think we did such a wonderful job, that we deserve a pat on our backs, even if we run the risk of sounding, oh, full of ourselves.

This weekend was one of the best performance experiences I've ever had. We all worked very hard on the music, which I will say is not easy stuff! Often, I wonder whether the audience realizes how much work it is to memorize the repertoire that we do, sing 8-minute acapella pieces that have 6 parts in mixed formation and still keep it all on pitch. We don't always manage to do this successfully, of course, but we were able to pull this off twice this weekend, along with other challenging pieces with bizzare breakneck tempos, Hungarian and Spanish tongue twisters set to sixteenth note rhythms, dissonant chords, and elusive pitches.

Both evenings, we got (almost instant) standing ovations. Which felt very satisfying. It was probably one of the best performances we've given since I joined the chorus, and according to some of the longer-term members of the chorus, perhaps even one of the best performances that our choir has given in its history.

It made up for the disappointingly low audience turnout. Actually, considering that there were half a dozen concerts going on the same time as our concert, the turnout was not bad, but of course, I think back to the other night when I witnessed a relatively full house for the Mozart requiem concert and wished for an audience of that size and grandeur.

Several of us talked about this after the concert. Of course, our modern avante garde women's choral music is probably never going to have as much mass appeal as a great classical masterpiece such as the Mozart Requiem; however, for all of the interest people in this area seem to have in classical music, and for the amount of work we put into the music, the dismal audience turnout is a bit puzzling.

For example, I tell my friends about our concerts--many of these people would go see Iztak Perlman, Yo Yo Ma, or Chanticleer. And no, the point is not to suggest that we are comparable to any of these groups; the point is to point out that many of my friends are interested enough in classical music to seek out performances of these aforementioned "brand name" performers. Yet, I cannot get most of these people interested in our concerts. Granted, for some of them, their current family situation (having young babies) makes it difficult to attend concerts.

Even when I do succeed in enticing people to come, I know that they are more coming for me (i.e. to support me) than for the music. In fact, that is probably the case with 90 percent of our audience. While it is nice to get support from one's friends, I wonder if our music and music making is enough to sell itself.

In other words, is it compelling music? Does it speak to the people? If we were to remove all of the personal connections we have to the audience, can our music-making sell itself to random strangers?

I think it does, but as someone who has a vested interest in the music, it is very hard to be objective. Based on the audience levels, the answer is "probably not".

However, I did meet a couple from Sacramento who told me they happened to be in town for a few days, were looking for something to do, saw a listing in one of the local papers and decided to check us out. They are singers themselves, and told me how much they enjoyed our concert and the programming. They were effusive with praise.

While a bigger audience would be nice (and heck, more familiar faces in the audience would also be nice), it is these folks--often total strangers--who are musicians themselves and go out of their way to come see us, and then tell us (sincerely) how much they enjoyed our performance that make the experience worthwhile.

* * *

Our conductor read a very insightful excerpt from a book that Aaron Copland wrote in 1949 but is just as relevant today. A great passage which I found on the NYT and will quote here (the rest of the article is actually a fantastic read):

"Why is it that the musical public is seemingly so reluctant to consider a musical composition as, possibly, a challenging experience? When I hear a new piece of music that I do not understand I am intrigued -- I want to make contact with it again at the first opportunity. It's a challenge -- it keeps my interest in the art of music thoroughly alive.

But sadly I've observed that my own reaction is not typical. Most people use music as a couch; they want to be pillowed on it, relaxed and consoled for the stress of daily living. But serious music was never meant to be used as a soporific. Contemporary music, especially, is created to wake you up, not put you to sleep. It is meant to stir and excite you -- it may even exhaust you. But isn't that the kind of stimulation you go to the theatre for or read a book for? Why make an exception of music?

It may be that new music sounds peculiar for the sole reason that, in the course of ordinary listening, one hears so little of it by comparison with the amount of conventional music that is performed year in and year out. Radio and concert programs, the advertisements of the record manufacturers, or school curricula -- all emphasize the idea, unwittingly, perhaps, that "normal" music is music of the past, familiar music that has proved its worth. "

Copland would've liked our music. It certainly stirred, excited, and exhausted--many of us.

A bunch of us ended the exhausting concert weekend with some great Indian food from Shivas. A perfect ending to a very good weekend. We all went home feeling quite sated.

An Evening of Mozart

Despite being brain-dead all day at work, and despite it being a day before my own concert, I couldn't pass up the opportunity to go hear a live performance of one of my favorite works, so I went with 2 friends to go listen to a performance of the Mozart Requiem put on by the Stanford Symphonic Chorus last night.

It was held at Stanford University's Memorial Church, a wonerful venue with great acoustics and somewhat garish gold frescoes whose beauty grows on you the more you go there.

For the mere price of a movie, I got to hear a fabulous live performance of one of the great choral masterpieces! What a bargain. (My two friends who are grad students got to hear it for $5 a piece.)

Although I've listened to the Requiem many times before, this was my first time hearing it live if you don't count summer sing-alongs. I must say that although I have a very good version of it at home (John Elliot Gardiner w/ the Monteverdi Choir), nothing beats hearing it live in such a beautiful space.

The choir was absolutely massive. There must've been about 300 people in the choir.

Stanford is on a quarter system, so the choir has only started rehearsing this piece in early April for a total of 7 or 8 rehearsals. Despite this very short season, I thought they put on a fantastic performance.

The hushed sections were very hushed; the cutoffs on pesky consonants like "s" were very together (which for a choir that huge is quite a challenge!); the delivery was wonderfully expressive and moving.

The orchestra was also wonderful. As a singer (and as a former orchestra member), one of the annoyances I have experienced with orchestras is that they tend to be too loud loud loud and overpower the singers, but the balance was great last night.

One thing I like doing when I go to concerts is watching conductors--how they interact with the musicians, their movements, how they engage with the score, etc. The conductor, Steve Sano, looked so graceful and poised. He almost looked as though he was dancing like a swan, but without being distracting the way many conductors are. His baton drew graceful arcs in the air, all the while keeping a meticulous beat.

Ok, now that I gushed on and on how wonderful the performance was, the negatives:
-As someone who now sings in a choir that uses no music, I missed the interaction with the singers a bit and noticed that many of them were looking down in their music a lot, but their sound was majestic, robust, lyrical, subtle and everything in between.

-The only thing I didn't like about the performance was the soloists. I should preface this by saying that I almost always don't like soprano soloists because their vibrato is too shrilly. This was also the case last night. But I also did not like the male soloists much either. I did not like their individual voices, nor did I like the way they sounded together. When all four of them sang together, they did not blend well at all.

Finally, some observations:
-I did not know that this piece has no french horns in it. I was a bit surprised by the lack of french horns.
-I also did not know that the soloists join in and sing the very last movement.

All in all, a very inspiring and moving performance. Despite being exhausted that day, I was very glad I went.

And now, I must go and prepare for my own concert!!

shay-nosh chak edyuh kichit tudok madyarul!

Actually, it is spelled, "sajnos csak egy kicsit tudok magyarul", but that is how you (roughly) pronounce this Hungarian phrase. I've been saying this phrase three times every day for the past week or two, and I think I can finally say it without stumbing over it. It means, "Unfortunately, I only know a little Hungarian."

I am trying to teach myself some Hungarian before going there this summer with our choir. I am only going to be there for 10 days or so, but I want to be able to say important things, like, "No, I want dark chocolate, not milk." or "Does this product contain meat?" (I am pretty certain that the answer to the latter question will likely be "igen" (yes). )

Given my very small Hungarian vocabulary (yes, no, hello, are you _______, etc.), I'm not sure if spending 2 weeks to master "unfortunately I only know a little Hungarian" is the most productive use of my Hungarian-studying time, but I have this delusion of going there and having a full-on conversation in Hungarian, and then being in a situation where this golden phrase will come in handy.

Ok, on that delusionary (is that a word?), I must run. I'm going to go listen to Mozart's Requiem.

Proudly Philistine

The NYT has an article that lists the best works of American fiction in the last 25 years. Among the listed books under the runners-up section is one I recently read, Confederacy of Dunces. There is a raving review here, which calls it a "comic genius" among other things.

I remember picking it up at the bookstore, b/c of all of the enticing things written about it on its back cover: "an epic comedy"; "an astonishingly good novel"; "destined to become a classic", etc. Oh, and it's a pulitzer prize winner.

I read the first chapter. I'm not getting into it. But I'm optimistic. Sometimes it takes a while to get into a deep book. I read the second chapter, and I still am not vested in the book. By the third and fourth chapter, it's readable, and even enjoyable in parts, but I'm still not quite getting the comedy and its purported astonishing goodness.

So I read on in this manner, hoping it gets better, or hoping I'll eventually get it. By page 240, I decide that I'm too much of a literary philistine to fully appreciate the ingeniousness of this comedy and give up. Well, for now at least.

My short version of this book: The main character, Ignatius, is this lazy fat slob who makes these outrageous pronouncements (such as "what abomination is this"), which I think are supposed to be part of the humor. Then there are the other caricature characters--which to this impatient don't-see-the-subtle-layers reader, seem annoying, and un-PC and racist, but I gather are also supposed to be some multiply-layered ingenious social commentary.

I kept on reading, hoping that I will eventually "get it" (after all, it did win a pulitzer prize), and so that I wouldn't have to feel uncultured for not getting it.

Sometimes I think being cultured is highly overrated.

But I guess humor is (figuratively) funny like that. (Well, I guess it can be literally funny as well.) I consider myself to be rather easily amused, but yet, I often find myself not getting things that I feel like I should get.

The TV series Office Space--or was it Office? It's the British sitcom thing--is another example of humor that I just don't get. I've watched both the American and British versions of the very first episode (The British one is just plain awful; the American one is bloody awful. They've managed to take something that I thought was already bad and make it worse.) and haven't had the patience to try to give another episode a chance.

The boss in Office (Space) is obnoxious and makes these un-PC statements that made me uncomfortable/angry, etc., and somehow (as someone was explaining it), this is supposed to be some sort of black humor that is supposed to be funny precisely b/c evokes discomfort.

Huh?

Maybe one episode is not enough to give this show a chance, and maybe I might come back to it again at some future date, but I've decided for now that I have plebian tastes in humor, and instead of slogging through 240 pages of a book I don't enjoy b/c it is a Pulitzer Prize winner, and I have this biased notion that to not be able to understand and appreciate it is a reflection of my lack of culture, I should just shamelessly admit to my ignorance much earlier (like say page 20?) and move on to a book I enjoy more.

Senegalese Lepidopterists and Chinese Soccer Players

There is a Senegalese lepidopterist who has his temporary office next to mine. He slams doors, which I find a tad annoying. If this were an ordinary workplace, I would simply ask him to please close his door a bit more quietly. But I work at a bit of an odd place, where there are high-level people. In fact, they are so high level (and they always seem to stick the highest level=highest maintenance people next to me, since the adjacent office used to be occupied by another very high level person who now occupies an even higher level post in our government.) that these people never usually bother to introduce themselves to me, and they always seem to slam doors and keep them closed. Actually, the latter is perhaps because I blast my classical or choir practice music so that I can tune out the slams, cell phone conversations, etc. I once did mention the door-slamming to someone, and I was told that so-and-so-high-level-person is notoriously difficult, so just deal.

Why do they put such high level people near such pions? Actually, I think I meant peon.

But back to this lepidopterist. He isn't actually a lepidopterist, nor is he Senegalese, but because of the politics and culture of my odd workplace, my co-worker and I have devised a system of coming up with alias identities for high-level officials whose identities we are not supposed to talk about. So when the head of state of some unnamed country in Africa came to visit and we were supposed to feign ignorance about knowing of his presence, the code alias we used for him was the Chinese soccer player.

Now another former high-ranking person is here. So he is a Senegalese lepidopterist. My co-worker picked out this pseudo identity for him.

At this rate, if we have more top secret high level officials visiting, my ears will go deaf, but my vocabulary and geography skills might improve.

I'd like a caper on the side of that chord, please.

Today during rehearsal, our director was parsing a chord in one of our pieces. The alto 2s and soprano 1s have the root(?) and fifth, while we (I sing second soprano) have the third. The alto 1s have a weird note that adds color to the chord, or as he put it, "it's the caper that adds a little spice to this chord." (Then he said sort of sheepishly, "I love capers. . ..") It was too precious an image not to capture in print.

Unfazed

I have been toying around with the idea of a blog so I thought I'd give it a try. I suppose I should explain my title, which sounds mediterranean (well, to me it does anyway), but actually, it is just the character for my name. In Chinese, it means "almond", but in Japanese, it means "apricot".

(Btw, a small aside to grammar nitpicking types (which I confess I am. . .sometimes): I know that according to American grammar conventions, the comma and period should be inside of the quotation marks, and I have enough people correcting me whenever I do this at work. To me this (punctuation inside quotes) makes no sense whatsoever, but fine. Someone made these rules hundreds of years ago, and so we have to stick by them. But since this is my own blog, I am asserting my will and keeping these pesky punctuation marks where I think they belong--which is outside of the quotes. Quite frankly, I don't see why semicolons and question marks belong outside of quote marks, while periods and commas do, when they serve the exact same function. And heck, if the Brits are allowed to do this, why can't we? Someone give me a compelling reason why this makes sense and I will contain my punctuation. But until then, I shall let them run wild.)

Our choir was featured in our local newspaper. A very nice article which called us "unfazed". Since I would hardly describe myself as "unfazed", I was quite tickled by this description of us. I decided to entitle my first entry "unfazed" partly as a tribute and partly because I kinda like this image of being unfazed.

Well laundry beckons, so I shall sign off my inagural post. (I feel like I should've posted something more profound-sounding.)