My fabulously productive day at work

With abject apologies to my boss. . .

-Arrive at work before 8 a.m.
-Do actual work for 1 hour
-Talk to one of the researchers about pseudo-despotic regime programs~15 minutes. Tells me I should apply to pseudo-despotic regime programs, because they are much easier to get into than despotic regime programs.
-11:00: take a "short" break to fill out a gazillion transcript request forms (one for each of the 5 schools I attended times a gazillion programs I'm applying to).
-12:00-I'm still filling out damn forms; decide that I need to get this done and figure I'll either make up the time later today or take PTO for the time I didn't work.
-at some point, I do some real work for a short time
-2:00-I walk over to the registrar's office to hand deliver my own school's transcript requests.
-2:03-I arrive and find out that the office is closed for Thanksgiving holiday and nearly have a breakdown.
2:03 and 30 seconds-A wonderfully sympathetic staff must've seen how dejected I looked and opens the door; I explain that Princeton's despotic regime program needs transcripts by 1 December and start pleading with them. They agree to process my request.

I am eternally grateful. Beyond words.

2:05 woman behind counter starts processing my request for 12 separate orders. She says she'll do this while I wait, since some of the instructions are a bit involved. Thinking I can watch her and make sure she gets all of this right, I stick around.

3:05 An hour has passed and she has processed just four out of the 12 I need. I tell her that I need to run and ask her to process just the ones that are sent to me.
3:15 I'm still waiting for my 6 transcripts.
Meanwhile, I ask her to fill out one of the forms that is supposed to accompany one of the transcripts. She tells me she can't fill out the form, b/c my school doesn't issue class ranks. I ask her if she can just indicate that on the form and fill out the form anyway.

3:20 Still going back and forth; still waiting for the 6 transcripts; I'm losing patience and cursing myself for not bringing my linear algebra book with me.
3:30 Back at my office. Eat lunch while reading about deficits. Do some real work again for a while.
4:30 Decide to walk to my car and drive it closer, since I expect to be here late.
5:00ish-back at my office.
5:15 or so--am interrupted by an email from my dad who tells me that the institution where I did my junior year abroad 1)will not take transcript requests unless a)I show up in person, or b)I mail them a form. He claims they won't accept faxes. Incredulous, I look up the info, and sure enough, he is right.
5:30 Make a frantic call to the transcripts office in Tokyo and explain to the person that I wasn't aware of this new protocol; that I've ordered transcripts via my parents many times before, and explain that I need one of the transcripts sent by 1 December, so I wouldn't be able to mail the request to them on time.
Gracious person on the other side tells me that if I enclose a photo ID, sign it, etc., I can fax it, and then mail the forms later.
6:15 I finish filling out forms, writing a fax half in Japanese and half in English, typing out detailed instructions. I fax.
7:00 I get a confirmation slip telling me my fax didn't go through. I try again.
7:30 Fax finally gets through. I call to confirm that they received it. Marvel at how I've been here for 11 hours, of which I might've done 1-2 total hour of work. I try to get some work done.
8:00 Decide this is futile and head to car, planning to go to gym.
8:05 Decide I'm too tired/hungry to go to gym and head home.
8:35 Finally home, wondering how the hell it took 12 hours just to process transcript requests. (Granted, it was a lot of transcripts (close to 100 total) and I had to fill out a form for almost every single damn one, but still. . ..)

Meme-free zone

A quick post to say that I hereby preemptively declare this a meme-free zone.

5 more weeks of this madness, I hope. And to this madness I now must return. . . (sigh).

If classical music isn't supposed to be "relaxing". . .

Do I go listen to the SLSQ perform Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time tonight after my midterm? The midterm that I've been studying for days for, and is the cause of sleep deprivation, and will likely drain my brain of the ability to have any sentient thoughts afterwards?

Is this a good state of mind with which to go and absorb Messiaen's magnificence?
I like what I have heard of Messiaen, but this isn't one of these pieces to go listen to when one's brain has gone to mush. (Did I also mention I don't like clarinets all that much? Though I have to admit he does use its timbre quite well in this piece.)

Because I could seriously use some "relaxation" or at least decompress for a bit after this exam.

On the other hand, I really need to buckle down and get started on applications to despotic regime programs. (Though the reality is, I won't be in any mood to do this tonight.)
Not to mention, catch up on the econ homework/readings I've blown off to study for this exam that I need to do well on to make up for my lackluster grade on my last exam.
And I could always use a few hours of catch up sleep.
And omg. Read. A book. For pleasure.

But I have also been wanting to go hear this live for a while, and if I miss this performance, I don't know when there will be another live performance of this. (As opposed to Reading. A. Book. For pleasure, which I can theoretically do anytime. If I wasn't up at ungodly hours almost every day, that is.)

If I go, I'd be admitting that I'm going to a classical music concert to decompress.

At the expense of offending those of you who think that one shouldn't listen to classical music to relax/wind down, I have to admit, I do this quite a lot. For exam #1, my calm-my-nerves piece was Brahm's Piano Concerto #2. Right now, I'm listening to Janacek's Glagolitic Mass. To calm my pre-exam jitters. (Actually, the organ part I'm listening to right now kindof echoes my jittery nerves, which is kindof cool.) So nyeh.

So maybe I will just go and catch this performance and "relax" to it, depending on my brain capacity post exam.

And now, I must run off to take that exam.

(I just typed this on the quick while getting ready to go to class, so apologies in advance if this post made no sense (my thoughts seldom do these days) as well as for any spelling and grammatical errors. I'll probably look at this and cringe later.)

The key of anti-semitism. . .

Ok, if you are composing a piece of music and you want to insert an anti-semitic* shriek, what key would you use?

Hint: It's evidently used in all of Mahler's symphonies.

????

*given that it's allegedly in all of Mahler's symphonies, I am confused as to whether an "anti-semitic shriek" is a shriek that is anti-semitic, or whether it is something that shrieks at anti-semitism. On second thought, I am just confused, period.

Places I will not be living next year

On the top of that list is Boston. (actually, Cambridge, to be exact.)

Even though I'm applying to 3 schools in that area, which is more than any other city.

A pity, since of the places that offer despotic regime study, it's one of the places I wouldn't mind living for a few years. I'd need to figure out what to do come February, because February in Cambridge is miserable, but so is February in many other places I might end up living. Aside from February and cold enough weather to warrant real winter clothes, I could see myself living there. Sage broccoli might be there (though she has her heart set elsewhere), which would be a definite plus. Oh, and they are not homophobic over there. Plus it sounds far far more exciting than living in Wisconsin or Minnesota, though I realize beggars can't be choosers, and to be fair, I have never been to Minnesota.

But two of the schools I might apply to in the Boston/Cambridge area are the top two schools in despotic regime study where my chances of getting in are very slim (perhaps nonexistent), and the third school--well, is not one of my top choices for despotic regime study.

If I have no chance of getting in, I don't know why I need to invest time and money on applying, but one of my advisors, when he saw me cross these schools off my list, said, "Well, you probably won't get in, but you should still apply, because your file is competitive enough that it will get read. It's just that given how long you've been out of school, and given how competitive it is, your chances aren't too good.You should apply with the expectation of not getting in." (Note to others considering grad school: don't wait till you're 40.)

I guess appreciate his honesty, though maybe it's better to know for sure that I shouldn't bother applying to x school and just spare myself the time/trouble/anguish. The process would be far more efficient that way, and it would reduce the amount of false hope I might harbor.

On the other hand, I guess you just never know. Pigs might start to fly. (If I sound a little negative, it's b/c I've been a bit frustrated/brain dead/tired, etc. by this whole process.) Oh yeah, and the first time I applied to grad schools, I got into all of my reach schools (except Harvard, which evidently found me so worthless they sent me two rejection letters) , and got rejected from all of my "safety" schools. So I should probably heed that lesson and "just apply", so long as I do it and not expect to get in. But bah. Where's the fun in that?

My parents are horrible, too. . .

My friend, in an email to her mother, after she got home from her first Wagner opera:
"You are a bad, bad mother for not ever introducing me to Wagner. You are a horrible parent!"

Take me out to the. . .gym

I went to the gym after work today. I'm normally not a fan of the gym, but I have to admit, it's highly efficient when one doesn't have a lot of time (or it is dark out, and one doesn't want to go running alone). It's also a fascinating place to do some people-watching, as it is the epitome of the divided attention-span lifestyle that is so common in our (post?)modern society. You know, the one where we can't just do one thing at a time?

And so it was at this gym as well--dozens of people exercising, listening to music, reading and watching sports all at the same time, all tuned into their own little worlds, oblivious to everything else. The only things missing were laptops. (Just wait. It's only a matter of time.)

For 40 minutes, I joined this grand assembly line, where I got a 40-minute workout, listened to jazz, read the Smithsonian, and caught the last 40 minutes of the Phillies vs. Rays game.

I normally don't watch baseball, because most games bore me to tears. You watch guys stand and do nothing for extended lengths, until someone hits a ball.

At first, I kept flipping back and forth between the magazine and the game, but eventually, I couldn't take my eyes off the screen. The Phillies were leading 2-1, and then the Rays tied them, and just as things were getting exciting (and dripping wet), they called off the game. Very odd. In fact, there were so many things I didn't get about this game.
1. Both teams are east coast teams. They were playing till close to 11 p.m. EDT. I'd be groggy about this on a normal weeknight, but it was dumping buckets of rain to boot. They can't play at saner/warmer times?
And speaking of buckets of rain,
2. Why on earth do they make people play in torrential rains? It wasn't just raining; it was pouring. Visibility sucks in rain. In fact, if you wear glasses (though maybe baseball players don't wear glasses?), it's even worse. I don't even like running or biking with glasses in light rain, but in this kind of rain, I don't see how anyone can see a fast ball coming at him.
3. At one point, one of the Rays players got tagged just as he was sliding into home base. It was a very close call. It earned the Rays the critical point to tie the Phillies to keep them in the game, so I got that it was important. The first three times, it was really interesting to watch them replay this in slow motion. But then they proceeded to play this 6 or 7 more times. I got it the first three times around. Do people really need to have this replayed 10 times?
4. They ended up suspending the game. Talk about anti-climactic. Why didn't they just postpone the game in the first place?
What a strange sport.

On the fence about prop 2

Please don't call me an animal hater, but I'm torn about Prop 2.

It should be a no-brainer, because in theory, I'm all for more humane conditions for animals, and I find factory and large-scale farming utterly appalling. This is why I mostly buy eggs and produce from the farmer's market, where I can grill farmers about their farming practices and make sure they're not injecting extraneous hormones into my eggs. (I have enough of my own damn hormones, thank you very much.)

So I'd like to vote yes on Prop 2, because I support the principles.
It would be so easy to do that and be done with it.

But I am voting no on 8 and 4, because I don't think these issues should be under the purview of the voting citizenry. We already have laws about these issues. Why put the ball back into our court?

And thus is my sentiment with prop 2. Why should regulations about farms and animal rights be left up to common citizens? I'd like to vote yes on this, but I don't know enough about the issue to know what the ramifications are if I do vote yes. All I'd do is vote based on my emotions. How does this serve the state and its citizens, if I can get laws passed solely based on my emotions (multiply me by several million voters)? There are people out there who know far more than I do about the effects of enacting such a law. Why aren't they deciding on this instead of leaving it to Joe Voter?

What next? Letting the average voter who knows nothing about government outlays and revenues vote on whether to abolish the state income tax?

Problem #2—suppose this proposition passes, but Prop. 8 doesn't. This means I live in a state where people don't have regard for basic human rights, but are willing to grant animals the right to graze around, stretch their legs and eat steak. I know they're different sorts of rights, but I think the point still holds. How California looks to the rest of the U.S. is really the last of my concerns, but if I were an out-of-stater and saw that California's citizens passed the chicken rights measure, but denied gays the right to marry, I'd probably be judgmental and think all sorts of things about how weird we are.

Which brings me to
Problem #3—perhaps it's a sign of how well-off we are, that we have nothing better to deliberate on than whether a chicken gets to stretch its legs out for 15 or 45 minutes, but it annoys me that we are even debating about this, when there seem to be so many more dire problems, which granted, are out of CA voter's reach, but I find far more pressing.

How could we possibly be arguing over the rights of chickens to get fresh air, when there are tens of thousands of children in India and Pakistan and other parts of the world, as young as 8, essentially imprisoned and forced to sew soccer balls for 18 hours, for example? Who speaks out for these people's rights to get fresh air?

Or the rights of elderly Chinese women who were sentenced to a year of hard labor, because they followed the rules of their government and applied for a petition to protest?

Or the rights of people whose constitutional rights to due process are waived, and are extraordinarily rendited to some undisclosed location by the CIA, despite the fact that this is a flagrant violation of U.N. conventions?

I realize that not voting yes on Prop 2. doesn't address any of these problems.

I'm annoyed that I've already given this much more time and attention than it deserves.

Do I vote in favor of something because I agree with the provisions in the proposition, or do I shoot it down, because I don't support this method of governance via popular vote and find the topic somewhat frivolous?

Not getting it

JoL: I'm throwing an election party. Do you want to come?
Anzu: Sure. When is it?
(JoL and Sage are in stitches next to me.)
Sage: election party. (To JoL) Don't invite her. She doesn't get it.
. . .
Anzu: I have a class, but depending on the time, maybe I can make it. We should have a post-election party to celebrate McCain's victory.
(Again, they burst into laughter.)
Sage: Uh, I think that's the point of the election party.

Evocative and hauntingly beautiful!

The question of the day is if you take some entity and call it evocative, alluring and all sorts of flattering adjectives, and then tell tens of millions of people this, keep broadcasting this until people believe it, does the entity eventually become those things it is described as, even if it didn't start out necessarily possessing these qualities? And what if enough people do believe that random entity="evocative", "alluring", etc.?

A non-sequitur quick lazy post--this arrived in my inbox today:
"His music was little known in the U.S. before KDFC began playing it two years ago. Since then, the hauntingly beautiful and evocative works of composer/pianist Ludovico Einaudi have kept him among our best-selling and most requested artists.

Based on that success, Einaudi is embarking on his first U.S tour and will debut here on Thursday, November 20 at a KDFC Nightclub Concert at Bimbo’s 365 Club.

As usual, Club KDFC is the first to get the news. Act now!"

I have other adjectives to describe his music. I'll stick with my edgy Bartok, thanks.

Vote by mail

I was wondering, does anyone go to the polls to vote anymore?

I don't know if this is a geographic thing or a generational thing, but I've been discovering over the course of the past few weeks, via conversations about the elections with various people, that everyone I seem to know votes by mail-in-ballot. (Well, either that, or some cannot vote at all.)

Granted, my sample size is small and probably skewed (20-30 or so people who mostly range in age from mid-20s to early 40s, all of who live in this area) , so it's really not representative of the entire population, but it's also odd that I have not run into a single person who actually goes to the polls to vote. I mean, isn't this how the rest of the country votes? (Someone out there still goes to the polls to vote the traditional way, right?)

I used to vote this way in NJ, b/c back when I lived there, you didn't really have a choice. One had to have some sort of extenuating circumstances to be eligible for absentee voting, which was annoying, b/c one year it conflicted with my class/work schedule. Since then, it seems that NJ has relaxed its restrictions.

But in CA, you don't have to provide any reasons to be eligible to vote via absentee ballot. You just fill out a form, and unless you reverse your request, a ballot automatically gets mailed to you, come election time, no questions asked. It's actually wonderfully convenient. I've been a vote-by-mailer for several years, and it's nice to be able to fill out my ballot in piecemeal, as I make up my mind about certain things (For example, for this election, props 4 and 8 were filled out right away.), and from the comfort of my own living room.

Curious whether this is an anomaly or representative of a larger trend, I did some poking around on the internet to see what vote-by-mail percentages were like in other states. In California, slightly less than half of us cast ballots by mail for the 2006 election. In Oregon, everyone votes by mail, and in Washington (state), according to this article, 95 percent of the votes for the August primary election were cast by mail.

I've only looked up west coast states, but the interesting thing about this is that it might affect the way candidates campaign. Again, I'm not necessarily claiming that there is a correlation, but compared to the rest of the nation (particularly the east coast and that area by Ohio), both presidential candidates have spent minimal (or no) money on campaign ads here on the left coast.

I suspect it also changes the manner of voting, though I can only offer anecdotal evidence to support this. In my case, for example, casting ballots has typically been a group endeavor. A group of us usually get together, read through the various propositions, and if the wording is convoluted enough and we are feeling sufficiently apathetic (which is the case 70-80 percent of the time, and before you give me a hard time for not taking my voting privileges seriously enough, please note that we have sixteen ballot measures we have to vote on, in addition to all of the candidates, assembly people, council people we must vote on. So nyeh.), we vote based on who endorses or opposes the proposition. We don't always vote the same way, but there is a sort of group-effort mentality to voting.

To wit:
Anzu: These 3 propositions about school spending, what's this about? Do any of them help the schools?
Ch: It says here that the _________ Teacher's Federation supports it.
Ala: Oh, that's the fake teacher's association. You don't want to vote in the same direction they do, b/c it hurts teachers.

Or:
Anzu: 4 freaking propositions about Indian gaming. They all sound the same to me. I'm totally indifferent. How are you voting?
Ala: I don't know enough about this issue, so I'm going to vote in favor of brown people, because I'm brown.
Anzu: Hmm. I'm indifferent, and brown too, I guess, but in order to cancel out your vote, I think I will vote no on all of these.

Ok, I'm being slightly facetious, but for measures I'm indifferent about or can't be bothered to read the fine print for, this sort of voting by consensus happens more often than not.

I don't miss going to the polls much, but it does make voting somewhat anti-climactic, since many of us have long voted by the time the rest of the nation is abuzz with election day hype, particularly in the last few days leading up to the election.

Die Tote Stadt!

Ok, I need to take a few moments and gush about "Die Tote Stadt" for just a brief moment. I just got back from it, and the music was stunningly beautiful. I knew nothing about this opera, other than the fact that it doesn't come around to these neck of the woods often. I did listen to parts of the soundtrack so I had an idea of the music, but listening at home is never quite the same as experiencing it live.

Traffic was crazy going up (thanks to Fleet Weekend and the HMB Pumpkin Festival going on at the same time), but the parking gods were looking down on me very favorably today, so I found a parking spot within 2 blocks from the War Memorial Opera House and barely made it to the box office within 5 minutes of closing. (Phew.)

Instead of standing room, I got rush tickets, since they were available. I really need to find a way to take more advantage of the musical offerings of the city. I love the fact that I can get orchestra seats for a first-rate opera for just $25.

They put me in the third row, which means the balance wasn't great, but I got to watch Runnicles conduct and watch the orchestra for a change, which was nice, since I never get to see them so up close. They usually sound excellent, but today, they sounded better than I ever remember them sounding.

I enjoyed everything about this opera--the surreal stage sets, the music, the orchestration. . .ok, the plot was a bit too anguished, but everything else made up for it.

Some of the arias were quite gorgeous. The lead tenor who played Paul was really good, though my favorite singer was the baritone who sang Frank/Fritz.

I moved to one of the empty seats in the dress circle after intermission. (I moved partly for balance reasons, but also, there was an elderly couple who were (was?) whispering throughout parts of the music.) Balance was much better from up there(though after having heard "Lucia di Lammermoor" from the high balcony area, I'm convinced that that is where there is the best sound).

I just have one not-so-teeny complaint. I don't mind the coughing so much. I try as hard as possible to suppress coughs, but sometimes, I really need to cough. So a little coughing here and there doesn't bother me. But damnit people. When the orchestra is playing and there is no one singing, it is NOT OK TO TALK. The couple behind me were whispering every time there wasn't any singing, and then when I moved to the dress circle, during the opening of the third act, there were five sets of people whispering while the orchestra was playing. I don't mean just once, which, again, I wouldn't mind so much, but several people were doing this at the same time, and more than just once or twice. Do people think that the orchestra playing doesn't count as part of the performance, just because there is no singing? I thought about very politely asking the couple behind me to please whisper a bit more quietly (or better yet, not at all), but I shouldn't have to ask this of people. Besides, after paying $220 per ticket (that's $440 for both of you), don't you want to hear the lovely bassoon line? Or the beautiful violin solo? Apparently not.

Chihuly

mille fiori

I suppose it's too late to tell you to go catch this exhibit, since it's no longer at the DeYoung. So I'll just tell you that it was a wonderful exhibit. They let us take pictures, which made it even more enjoyable. Half the fun was playing with the lighting and shadows and trying to capture that on film. I went up on Friday of closing weekend, several weekends ago. I almost skipped it, since I was tired, but I was really glad I went. I have many more pictures on Picasa, but here are some of the highlights.

What I found really striking about Chihuly's works were the vivid colors and the shapes that seemed to defy glass's rigidity. These are his Persians. They seem to cascade down effortlessly, with grace and poise.

Persians

Then there were the Tabac baskets. They were modeled after baskets made by native Americans from the northwestern coast.

I was mesmerized by the effects of the lighting and shadows. In fact, although this was the least colorful of his works, this was my favorite section. The subdued colors helped bring out the lovely interplay between the different contrasting elements: the luster of the baskets vs. dull the wooden surface, the translucence of the glass objects vs. the opacity of the wood, and the objects themselves vs. their own reflections.

Here is an image of one of his works from the Macchia Forest series. I loved the deep blue hues juxtaposed with the vibrant yellows in this one. I just wish I had a better photo. . .
Then there were the balloons. This one looked like our solar system.And icicles. . .
actually, chandeliers that looked like they came out of the kingdom of Narnia.
Again, note the interplay between the object and its shadows.

And many many more cool objects.

Our next president

And in other news, I've stopped worrying about the election, because if, unlike the stock market, the past is any indication of the future, then I just saw proof that Obama will be our next president. See for yourself if you don't believe me. If we don't want to break this 28-year streak, he must win, right? Right?

Relistening to my Lord of the Rings soundtrack

After my ancient Gree—nay, Linear Algebra—exam today, I decided I needed something the equivalent of vegging out in front of a TV and thus dusted off my LoR CD and relistened to it. I haven't listened to it since—gosh, has it really been that long?—2001 or so.

Howard Shore has been getting a quite a beating fairly recently (as has John Williams) in one of the discussion threads of one of my FB groups, so I listened to the CD, mostly to see if he really was as bad as people made him out to be. Granted, after not listening to it for years, it turns out I didn't remember significant chunks of this soundtrack, but I honestly didn't remember it being that bad. Comparable to Williams (in fact, for a while I thought the soundtrack was composed by Williams, so that tells you how much I know), which means innocuous, but not horrible music. If you are expecting Bartok or Mozart-level quality when you listen to these things, then yes, of course the quality is probably pretty bad.

But I don't think this is a fair comparison. In fact, I only own one other movie soundtrack and both are in the "other" (not classical) category. I don't know enough theory to know what constitutes classical music vs. what doesn't (I'd classify all of John Williams as non-classical music, but several musician-types disagreed with me, so I defer to their knowledge; Satie is also considered classical music, but again, his Gymnopedies didn't sound like classical music to me, so I give up.), but movie soundtracks just don't seem to fit into this genre. Thus, comparing movie soundtracks, which were meant to be more background music, to something that is intended to be listened to more attentively, is a bit unfair.

That said, I'm "listening" to the soundtrack as I write this, and I still hesitate to call it "bad", but I was sad to discover that it didn't have the same pull it did almost eight years ago, which got me wondering whether it was the music itself or the associations I've made with this music that once had strong appeal.

You see, this was one of these soundtracks that is inextricably linked with the guy I dated during part of grad school, and my circle of friends during that time. In fact, when I picked up the CD case, the first thing that came to mind was not a particular passage from the soundtrack, but an image of a car flying down some rural road. Both of us were LoR fans (the books, though the movie wasn't bad, either). He owned the soundtrack first and used to play it in his car a lot, so I think I shortly followed suit and got my own copy, perhaps to relive those long drives where we had this playing in the background.

As I relisten to the CD, it's not the music per se that is memorable, but more that certain lines evoke memories of things C and I did together. A certain measure reminded me of a specific road in Pescadero; another line brought back memories of the anticipation we felt while we waited for the first movie to come out; yet another line conjured up an image of a random switchback from a hike we went on, while one of the flute lines brought back a conversation about speeding tickets. So many of these associations came flooding back as I half-listened to the CD.

There's the night M took us to see the second movie in his then-new car. The night we "celebrated" M's breakup with his girlfriend. The week we spent trying to strategize which movie theatre we should see this in. The I-don't-want-to-go-see-this-movie-with-someone-who-doesn't-know-who-Gandalf-is conversation I had with J. I could go on, but why bore you all?

Perhaps it's telling that I haven't listened to this CD in years; I have also lost touch with C. It's not that I'm actively avoiding him (certainly not after all of these years), but I just haven't really gone out of my way to try to track him down once I realized early on during our post-breakup friendship we superficially tried to maintain, that I wasn't going to get the "closure" I wanted, and subsequently went our separate ways. Of course I've Google-stalked him once to see what he was doing, and Facebook-stalked him to see if he's on FB (he is) but that was about it.

Now the CD has finished playing, and other than conceding that yes, there were some really bad sections, I can't really tell you what I thought of the entire soundtrack, because to be honest, I don't remember what I just listened to. Once my mind started re-conjuring up all of these past associations, I think I tuned out the actual music and these memories from that chapter of my life kindof hijacked my brain.

Then again, I think this was probably how I used to this soundtrack back then, too. Gosh. It's strange that I just listened to a CD and I can't tell you anything about it, other than give you a list of memories it brought back. (And having my brain fried from my latest marathon of studying and sleep deprivation certainly doesn't help matters.)

Extremely. Grumpy. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.

Do you know what makes me really really grumpy?

Opening the election materials and finding a FOUR page ballot that contains SIXTEEN freaking ballot measures that I have to vote on. I remember when I lived in NJ when ballots were ONE page long. That is how long they should be. A max of two pages, with maybe a half a dozen measures at most. But SIXTEEN!?

And for f#$'s sake (yes, I'm really (really) grumpy, as you can see), we just had an election seven months ago, in which, I believe, I had to wade through seven propositions, and I thought that was pushing it. But damnit. SIXTEEN? If I had an extra hand, I still wouldn't have enough fingers to count how many damn measures/propositions there are.

Has the state legislature no mercy? I know I'm complaining about a privilege that I shouldn't be complaining about, and I'd take this over being a citizen of many despotic regimes and value the democracy and freedoms that come with being a U.S. citizen, but grumble, grumble, grumble. Complain. Complain. Complain. Blog. Blog. Blog.

Sixteen freaking ballot measures. That's
One
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Seven
Eight
Nine
Ten
Eleven
Twelve
Thirteen
Fourteen
Fifteen
Sixteen
(in case you can't visualize how long a list of sixteen items is, since I'm sure other state's ballots are much shorter.)

New Jersey has a mere two questions on their ballot.
Montana has three.
Arizona appears to have eight.
I don't have time to look up every state, but does anyone live in a state that comes anywhere close to sixteen freaking ballot measures? (Including local measures.)

Ok, and do you know what makes me even grumpier than seeing SIXTEEN freaking measures I have to make time to wade through, read, look up the pros and cons and who supports/who doesn't, and then make a decision on?

Seeing the same. damn. proposition on the ballot for three elections in a row. It's the parental consent/wait period for minors who want abortions. This proposition has reared its ugly head three times, and each time, it has been struck down by voters. The state barely denied passing it the last time, which I find quite disturbing, but basically, we voted that minors shouldn't have to seek parental consent to get an abortion. I'm pretty sure we also voted against a waiting period requirement, too.

And now, it's back on the damn ballot again. Again. Because some chastity ball-going idiot got enough signatures from his right wing friends to get this on the ballot for the fourth. freaking. time. How many times do we have to vote NO on this for people to give up?

And for the record, I don't understand what sane parent wouldn't vote against requiring parental consent and wait periods. I mean look. It's not that I want my (hypothetical) kids sleeping around and getting pregnant at 13. If I were a parent of a teenager, I would hope that my kids be careful enough to not get pregnant, and if they aren't, I'd hope they'd feel comfortable enough to tell me. But if they aren't, I'd rather have them get a legal, safe abortion behind my back than have them die because they went to some illegal, unregulated abortion-via-coat-hanger clinic.

Oh, and there's a proposition for banning same-sex marriages. I feel like I've seen this silly one before, too.

It's funny that this state gives off this aura of being so progressive, and yet, we have all of these measures that really ought to be non-issues. Aren't we supposed to be the state that is the paragon of liberal ideals? Why the hell are we voting on gay marriages and minors getting abortions once again?

If our voices keep being ignored and undermined thus, then what we have in this state (which, btw, is home to the largest population) is not a healthy democracy. Do the rest of the states have any idea how dysfunctional voting is in this state?

Ok, I now need to go calm myself down enough to put in 2 hours of linear algebra studying.

The National Anthem à la the SF Chron

Quick. Without using the search powers of Google, how many octaves does our national anthem span?

I pondered this very question at work yesterday, though not out of idle curiosity.

So before you read on, take a moment, and sing the (U.S.) national anthem to yourself and figure out the range. No peaking at scores, no instrumental aids, and no internet; just your voice.









If you answered 1.5 octaves (or an octave plus a fifth, which is not exactly 1.5) that is what I got. Sans score, sans piano, and sans Google, I'd like to add.

I started singing the tune in my head: "Oh-h say" (paused here, noted that this is the lowest note, which I arbitrarily called "do" and continued on)
"can you see, by" (noted that so far, it goes to a mi above the octave). . .
"rocket's red" (highest note: a fifth above the octave. Total range: 1.5 octaves.)

Well, I would like to know what version the SF Chron folks sing, b/c theirs evidently spans 2.5 octaves.

Now, there is an arrangement of the Star-Spangled Banner that we sometimes do, in which the top soprano part goes a fourth above the highest note (a high c, in our version) after one beat on "free-ee", in which case, that particular version spans 2 octaves, but even then, we're still a fifth shy of whatever version the SF Chron has in mind.

Hmm. I suppose this is the sort of thing that copy editors don't necessarily catch, b/c it's not a grammatical error? Still, you would think that it would be easy enough to do a Google search and do a little fact-checking.

(And not to nitpick, but websites that are in the business of writing (and I'm not talking about personal blogs or websites of artistic organizations, here.) really ought to learn the html for m-dashes and use them properly; or at least use two hyphens like the WSJ does. They're quite different from hyphens.)

Either way, the author's main point still holds—that the anthem is hard to sing. . .well.

Which made me wonder, are there (vocal) pieces that span 2.5 octaves? I mean, that's a pretty impressive range.

I couldn't think of any off the top of my head, but remembered the choral sections of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony being extremely annoying to sing, because of its ridiculously high range, so I checked my score. Well, the soprano section spans from a d to a freaking high b above the staff, so the range is greater than the national anthem, but not quite two octaves.

The other one I vaguely remembered having a high range is the soprano solo in Mozart's Mass in C-minor. Sure enough, within the first few pages of the soprano solo entrance in the Kyrie, Mozart has the soprano soloist go from an a-flat below the staff to a high a-flat—a jump of 2 octaves in just under 3 notes flat!

Later in Et incarnatus est, Mozart expects the soloist's voice to span from a low b (below the staff) to a high c, which is more than a 2-octave span.

I suspect that the Queen of the Night aria from the Magic Flute also has a pretty wide range, but I do not have the score to verify this.

And the answer is. . .

A The price of a movie ticket

B The price of an opera ticket

A The quantity in column A is greater
B The quantity in column B is greater
C The quantities are equal
D The relationship cannot be determined from the information given

It's official. Here in the Bay Area, it is officially cheaper to attend an opera than it is to go see a movie.

The price of a movie ticket: $10.50
The price of the cheapest ticket at SF Opera: $10.00

Who said opera was for the wealthy?

Of course, I only discovered the whole standing room process this past year, since they don't exactly display this prominently on their website. One has to know that such things exist (and quite frankly, most of my non-opera-frequenting friends have no idea that you can go see opera for $10), and then search for it.

Still, what a wonderful thing to make opera so accessible and affordable.
Now if only I had more time to take advantage of this. . ..

Standardized tests in two parts

I. triumphant

Not that many people care (however, this being my blog, I exercise the right to write about things that only I and two or three other people might actually care about), but I am happy to report that my first hurdle towards despotic regime-dom has been cleared. I got my target score for the math section of the GREs. Phew.

I am so. damn. relieved.

Almost triumphant, in fact. Well, except that I got 100 points lower than I was targeting on the verbal section, but I guess we can't have it all. At some point, I need to figure out whether departments of despotic regime study care about the verbal enough that I should consider retaking this exam again, but right now, I'm so glad I passed the bar on the math section that I'm not going to worry about it for just one night. (Or until I get my scores for the written sections back.)

And I am proud to say that I did not even need to recruit the help of a certain Bulgarian male. Actually, truth be told, it wouldn't have been possible to have him take my math section, because can you believe—they actually make you write and sign a statement certifying that you are yourself, then take your picture, video tape you and pretty much watch you like hawks for the entire four hours behind glass windows. (More on this later.) It's one thing for me to lie for myself, but it's another thing to make someone else lie for you, and had I actually had third person take my exam, he would've had to lie on my behalf, which kindof kills that option of having someone else sit in on your exam for you.

Mind you, this isn't so much an "accomplishment" as a bare minimum bar I needed to pass in order to have my application be considered by some programs, so it's probably a bit premature to be patting myself on the back, but this is no small feat for moi. First, I have never done well (enough) on standardized exams. They have been the bane of my existence and probably the limiting reagent whenever I have applied to programs. Granted, two of these lousy scores may have been partly due to incompetent proctors, but the schools don't really care about these things when they look at your sub-par score, and you can't really complain about how a chronologically challenged proctor may have adversely affected your performance, because it just makes you look whiney. Second, I did so poorly on the first math section, that I was resigned to getting a lousy score and having to retake the exam again. However, in retrospect, this must've been the experimental section, because it was wicked hard and there was no way that I could've gotten anything higher than a 700 on that section since I had to blindly guess on at least 3 problems, was extremely iffy for another handful, and didn't even get to the last 3 or 4 problems in the end. (I've taken enough practice exams to know that this would've put my score well below 700.) In fact, this section put me in such a state of jittery nerves for the rest of the exam, that it was kindof hard to concentrate on the other sections. Until I got to the unexpected third section and regained some hope over the possibility that the first section might not count.

I had completely forgotten about the experimental section—until math section number two popped up after I thought I was done with the exam and was expecting a score report. Math section number two was a lot more reasonable, but I still expected to get a few wrong.

Thus I literally (very briefly) squealed in glee when I saw my score and realized that they must've not counted the first math section. In fact, I was dumbfounded, to tell you the truth.

This isn't me, but this (Sage Broccoli: I hope you don't mind me linking to your photo. I think only your friends can see it anyway.) is how I felt after the exam.

II. Standardized testing in 2008.

In case you've been out of the standardized testing loop, let me tell you that it is not what it used to be ten or even five years ago. The administrators have become completely paranoid to the point of it being absurd and ridiculous and extremely annoying.

First, they do not allow any backpacks into the room. Even five years ago, I was allowed to bring my backpack into the room, so long as I didn't dig into it during the exam, but really, what idiot would do that in the middle of an exam where people are watching you like hawks? Why do something to cast suspicion on you and risk having to throw out your scores?

In fact, much to my grave annoyance, they do not even let you bring your own pencils. Or bottled water. Or even tissues, to blow your nose with, which is really annoying, when one has allergies to contend with. I suppose they think that I might write some intricate code on tissue paper or stuff my lead pencil with crib notes? Well, ok, fine. I can deal with no water for a few hours and use writing implements that I haven't used since like fourth grade.

But then they also make you take off your watch. Now this, I resisted, because for two out of three standardized exams I've taken in the past, the room monitors royally botched up the time calls (I know this, because I always bring my own watch to keep time for myself), and both times in a way that wasn't in our favor, so I now have very little faith in their ability to accurately tell me when 30 minutes are up and mostly rely on myself to keep track of time. Thus, I was really not willing to part with my watch. I was extremely uneasy at entrusting the timekeeping to someone else, but I didn't really have much of an option.

They also don't like you keeping around extra layers of clothing in case you get cold. I had a hooded cardigan on at the start of the test, but at some point, got warm and took it off and hung it on my chair. I wanted to keep it nearby in case I got cold again. Mind you, they just inspected my pockets prior to entering the exam room, so they know it didn't have any cheat sheets hidden on or in it. Moreover, there were several people watching us like hawks on video monitors, etc., so it's not like I would've been able to clandestinely communicate with an external person with a hidden sleeve mic or anything like that. But as soon as I took my extra layer off, a room monitor came in and took it away and told me I can't have anything hanging on my seat because it violates protocol. Protocol shmotocol.

I have no idea what has happened in the past five to ten years to warrant this level of vigilance that bordered on paranoid absurdity, because in 2002, you just walked in, showed your ID, and simply took the exam. No fingerprinting, no taking of pictures, no signing 20 different waivers and no restrictions on bringing tissues to blow one's nose. I mean why the hell do they make us go through the trouble of writing out and signing a statement swearing that we won't cheat, use unauthorized aids, disclose the contents of the exam, etc. etc. if they are not going to take us seriously?

Anyway, I am so glad that it is over. Tomorrow, a new day, a new obstacle to surmount.

Modern Version of Gettysburg Address

(No doubt some of you have already seen this, but someone brought it up at dinner the other day, and we were in stitches over it. . ..)

Seven score and five years ago, Lincoln wrote the Gettysburg Address.

Six score and 17 years later, someone reworked it to fit boardroom presentation format and accommodate modern-day attention spans and intelligence levels.

Hmm. If I had any more brainpower left in me, I might have compared composers who were Lincoln's contemporaries (Brahms, Wagner, Liszt, and Beethoven, (if we stretch the timeline a bit) to name a few) to composers of the great powerpoint era, and then made some outrageous speculation about the correlation between our present-day powerpoint/axis-of-evil-worldview culture and lack of Beethoven/Brahms-caliber composers, but I'm too tired to substantiate such claims, so lucky for you, I'll spare you my brilliant thoughts on this matter.

Shosty and Cheese for under $6

A secondhand bookstore is a very bad place to go to for someone who is trying eke out a minimalist existence and not accumulate stuff. But sometimes, the deals are so good, one cannot resist.

As my one diversion from studying, I walked over to the used bookstore to try to get rid of my Devil Wears Prada and Bee Season. They didn't take Bee Season, but gave me $2 for Prada.

I had a 25% off general voucher and a 50% off food-related books voucher, so I bought the following items:

A Cheese Primer for $3.50. This is one of these want-but-don't-really-need type books, but for $3.50, who can resist? (Certainly not I.) It is food porn for those of us who like cheese. It tells you every little detail about the various kinds of cheeses. It divides the cheeses by country, and then has a handy index, so you can cross-reference. I like the fact that the author is very opinionated, dispenses sound advice, and has impeccable taste in fine foods—e.g. under Parmesan cheese: "Never buy this cheese pre-grated. It is simply folly to grate it in advance. Grate this miraculous cheese yourself, as you need it, always allowing the cheese to reach room temperature before grating. . .. American 'Parmesan' tastes like sawdust" and on the proper ways to eat it: "Parmesan is a superb eating cheese. It is marvelous as a first course with figs, melon, or any fruit. It marries beautifully with carpaccio or prosciutto drizzled with EVOO. It is wonderful slivered over an arugula salad . . ..", all of which are exactly the kind of things I'd say about Parmesan, albeit less eloquently. My kind of book in every way, except that my favorite cheese isn't listed as one of the "world's greatest cheeses". Humph.

Shostakovich, quartets #3, 7, 11, by the Fine Arts Quartet for a whopping $2.25. I suspect that this was a mispricing on the bookstore's part, because this CD was mistakenly filed under "C". His name is spelled "Chostakovich" on the CD, which may have threw them off, because the other $2.99 CDs were mostly rubbish and the other Shostakovich quartet CDs (properly filed under "S") were more like $7-$9. Even "dinner party classical" cost $4.99. (Hmm. Does the bookstore think that "dinner party classical" is worth $2 more than 3 of Shostakovich's quartets? Well, their misjudgement is my gain.) I have not heard the FAQ's rendition of Shostakovich, but for $2.25 there's almost no risk involved.

After applying my $2 store credit (for selling Prada), my total for cheese and Shostakovich came to $3.75.

もん 1991-2008

Our dog (the one who didn't compose any Beethoven symphonies) passed away this morning.

Even though I'm not a pet person, and knew this was coming, it seems that no amount of mental preparation or rationalization quite buffers you from the sadness and numbness that suddenly outpours out of nowhere when the reality hits. Kind of like a brick wall, really. One minute, you are theorizing about "when he dies" in an abstract sort of way and hoping that it stays that way, and the next minute, he's really gone, the theoretical becomes reality in a strange, surreal sort of way, and then you are stuck brooding over the implications of this ertwhile-theoretical, now fact: that I won't get to see, tease, play with, use as a footrest, and take silly pictures of him again, and that he won't be around the next time I go visit my family.

I mean, I was just talking about him with my brother last night. He was right there sleeping, breathing near my brother, while we were skyping away, I guess less than 10 hours before he went--wherever dogs go when they die.

He would've been over 110 in human years, so his time was definitely due. He lived a long, full life, and I dare say, lived a better life than probably many humans. He died in the most peaceful way possible--naturally, of old age.

In fact, truth be told, he was often a royal pain of a dog, and several times, the cause of much serious tension in our family.

And yet.

Isn't grief strange. . ..

But this sad process and our need to grieve--I guess is what makes us human.

We got him in the fall of 1991. JJ (my youngest brother) was 11. I have many pictures of the two of them being silly boys (see below). He (the dog) was an absolute beauty, but a royal pain, too. And quite a trouble-maker.

a head shot of one of my favorite pictures of JJ and M sharing
spaghetti. From like 1992 or so.

He had an annoying predilection for shredding toilet paper and knocking over garbage cans, especially while we were gone.

My parents tried to return him to the original owner when they decided to go back to Japan, rather than deal with moving him there, but JJ cried, so after one day, we brought him back, and my parents took him to Japan, where he lived a long, long life.

During his youth, he ran away from home several times, causing much mayhem. He'd eventually come back after carousing about and doing whatever teenage dogs do, but of course, this didn't stop my parents and my brothers from searching the entire neighborhood for hours.

But now, all of this is but a fleeting memory.

The biggest adjustment will be for my parents, and particularly for my dad. After having him around for practically (but not quite) half of their married lives, they will have to get used to the emptiness and the silence and the unturned garbage cans. (Though actually, I think he finally stopped doing that the last two years of his life. Still, he was turning them well into his 80s and perhaps even 90s.)

Well, may he rest in peace and turn over garbage cans to his heart's content, wherever he is.

Frustration . . .

is when you have to miss your colleague's engagement shower, b/c you have a class to go to
and
you leave work at 4:00 to get to said 5:30 class and are still 45 minutes late
and
by the time you get to class, there's only 25 minutes left of lecture
and
you realize it took you 2 freaking hours to drive a mere 28 miles to San Jose
and
you (slurp) have to (slurp) sit next to (slurp) the guy (slurp) who (slurp) has an annoying (slurp) tic and (slurp) sounds like (slurp) he's slurping (slurp) or smacking (slurp) his lips every three seconds (which I'm sure he cannot help, but is excruciatingly annoying all the same, if he's right behind you doing this, and you are already cranky from the traffic you had to deal with to get here)
and
after all of this, you sit through the remainder of the class and can't make heads or tails of anything that was said during the 25 minutes.
(sigh.)

on the other hand. . .

Bliss

is chopped up heirloom tomatoes with fresh mozzarella, basil from your own garden, and a few chopped kalamata olives thrown in for good measure, mixed up, and then generously seasoned with freshly ground pepper and salt, and a teeny drizzle of good quality EVOO and enjoying this on a balmy summer day
and
topping that with a postprandial piece of dark chocolate with ginger bits.


Gosh I'm so boring I kill myself sometimes.

Wedding tidbits

Boys, don't read this, since it will probably bore you.

* * *

Ala: I just read about my responsibilities as the maid of honor, and according to this guidebook, I'm supposed to help you pee. I love you dearly, but I'm not sure I want to take my relationship with you to that next level.
Ch: I'm perfectly capable of peeing on my own, so I won't need your help.

* * *

Ala reads something out loud about the symbolism of breaking glasses and how it's supposed to symbolize the irrevocability of the wedding vows.

Ch: That's hogwash. We have no such romantic notions. We do it to symbolize that life sucks and sometimes glasses break. Every Jewish person knows that.
An: So this whole glass breaking to symbolize irreversibility of marriage is revisionist history propagated by non-Jews?

Engaged, but. . .

Had a girls+guy night last night at H&NMs. I skipped the Mamma Mia part of the evening, but joined them for dessert. H&MM officially announced their engagement, and lots of oohing and aahing over rings, etc. ensued.

They bought a house together and have more or less combined/merged most of their belongings.

Their dishes and kitchenware are merged.
Their home decor and furniture are an eclectic mix of their collections.
They share a large closet for their clothes.
Their books coexist peacefully on shared shelves.

As for their CD collections? Heh. Still completely unmerged and in fact, located at completely opposite sides of the living room.

I don't know if this is the case for them, but several of my friends would probably sooner merge checking accounts than their music collections.

Pretty in pink

Alas, I couldn't find my linear algebra notes from college, but while I sifted through the contents of my boxed up past, I did come across this high school bio lab report from many many moons ago, which reminded me of why I wouldn't've (if that isn't a real word, it ought to be) survived in a school system in Japan, where you don't get away with submitting lab reports written in bright pink ink on purple paper.
I didn't pull this on everyone or do this all of the time, but I think I was practicing my mirrored image penmanship for some reason and my bio teacher graciously humored me. (Note his comments.) We still keep in touch.

My proclivity for pink ink continued through college, but I did this out of practicality rather than any inclinations to be non-conformist.

Final exam from literature class, ca. 1996

I discovered that in a class of 200+ students, when you are trying to locate your blue book exam among a pile of 200+, and you are the only one out of 200 students who took the exam in pink ink, then finding your exam out of the mass pile is very easy. (Yes, I really am that lazy.) It's too bad I went through an entire year of blue book exams before I figured this out.

And for the record, maybe I don't have any pink pens handy anymore, but I still need to take my notes in 2 or 3 different colored inks on different-colored paper.

Notes from class, ca. 2008

Still searching for slanted eyes

Are people ever turned off by the search terms via which someone lands up on their blog?

Well, when you've just come home exhausted from work/classes, the last thing you want to know is that five people landed on your blog today searching for some variation of "Why Asians have slanted eyes" or "Asians, tilted eyes". UGH.

First, lest someone land on this post using those very search terms, Asians do not have slanted eyes. And no, people should not get surgery to "correct" this "problem", either.

A less insulting way to say this is that we have epicanthic folds. Or maybe that we are mongoloid. Is the latter pejorative? I don't know, though I far prefer it to being told I have slanted eyes or that I have slits. I know cartoons make Asians look like they have slits that are slanted, and I've seen "Asian" dolls that don't exactly portray us in the most flattering light, but people, these are caricatures. I don't know if there is an English equivalent, but in Japanese, there is actually a term to describe our eyes: 一重。(Literally, "one layer". Does this word exist in Chinese?) Unfortunately, the J-E dictionary I have isn't too helpful. They suggest "single-edged eyelid" or "smooth eyelid" as a translation. Meh.

I have to admit that ever since moving out here from NJ, I hear far less of this nonsense, and less people I meet are inherently or overtly racist, whatever-ist, so I'm not taken aback as much when I hear ridiculous stereotypes about Asians or gays or any other group. I've also become better at tuning out ridiculous comments and not taking things personally. Yet, I guess one can't entirely shake off one's past, because stuff like this still bugs me somewhat. (Ok, more than somewhat, b/c I'm blogging about it.)

Perhaps because there is a whole lucrative industry in Japan that makes money off of such distorted notions of beauty where one can get their eyelids "corrected" via surgery or inserts or other silly ridiculous things. "Look like a Caucasian"; "Look more beautiful" these ads tout. I have no idea how many people do this, but there are ads for stuff like this and whitening skin all over fashion magazines, and if people weren't conditioned to think that Asian eyes were defective or ugly, such a uselessly self-esteem-denigrating industry wouldn't exist.

It also bugs me when my Asian friends say things that indicate that they've internalized this notion of Western beauty as the "ideal". If you ever look at Japanese comics, most of the characters are drawn with more Caucasian-looking features.

Part of the thing that bothers me is that I think people sometimes have no idea how offensive they are being when they say certain things. Some of it is not explicitly whatever-ist. (I'm not sure if "racist" is the right "ist".) For example, when my friend tells me that Asians are exotic-looking, or that she has a little bit of slanted eyes b/c Genghis Khan raped her ancestors (a topic on which I've written a long diatribe about long long ago, so I won't bore people here w/ my vituperative rants), I think she actually believes this and that she's not trying to be mean or offensive, b/c she is otherwise very sensitive. In fact, when I got upset over this once, her reaction was that "slanted" is not a negative term.

True, except that we almost always use this word in a pejorative or negative context, e.g. "slanted views". Plus I grew up around people who used to associate slanted eyes with ugliness. So maybe I'm hypersensitive, but as far as I'm concerned, slanted has negative connotations.

Much as I'd like to think that my childhood experiences are a thing of the past, people are still landing on my blog via search queries like "how to fix slanted eyes" or "why do Asians have slanted eyes".

Sometimes, these inherently ___-ist remarks are less overt, but still equally annoying. On the east coast, two questions I used to get a lot were 1. Do you have an American name? and 2. Are you ever planning on going back to your country? The people asking these questions are usually very nice people and I imagine wouldn't nec. think of these questions as offensive. In fact, I didn't really think anything of these questions until I moved out here and realized that no one asks you such things.

I can be more forgiving about 1. because Chinese people tend to have American names (Whereas Japanese people and most Koreans tend not to pander to people who can't bother to learn pronounce our names. Is it because we are we more vain?). I always found this practice of assigning oneself a more "American-sounding" name rather odd, but to digress a little bit, I think this might be a cultural thing related to how countries teach English. For example, in China, from what I've heard, students are (sometimes? often?) given American names as part of their English-learning experience. When I took Chinese, I was given a Chinese name. But in Japan, people just use their given names in English classes. Maybe it's a bit of a stretch to suggest that this might be one reason Chinese people are more likely to assign random English names to themselves than the Japanese. But really, how hard is it to pronounce Dongxiao? (Dong-shao) Or Xiaohong? (Shao-hong) I suppose some people give themselves English names to make things easier for poor addled white people who can't pronounce such complicated names, but the more people make a practice of doing this, the more people expect that all people with weird names like Anzu or Apricot or Patita have a more quotidian alternative name like Jane or John.

As for 2., 2. used to annoy me when I lived on the east coast and I wasn't as snarky and secure as I am now, but now, I've become jaded enough that I find this question more amusing than annoying. Actually, I haven't been asked this since I've moved out here (though back east, strangers used to ask me this within 10 minutes of introductory idle chatter.), so I don't know how I'd answer that question, were I ever to be asked this, other than my standard "excuse you?" or lately, 甚麼? (said with attitude, like a 北京er) seems to roll off my tongue quicker than anything in English.

I'm not trying to imply that everyone from the east coast is like this. I have many good friends in NY, NJ, DC, Boston, etc., none of whom are _____-ist. But I did encounter this sort of thing far more on the east coast than over here and I'm still reminded of people's biases when I occasionally go visit my home town.

Conversely, it's not necessarily the case that everyone here is more "openminded". Actually most of the people I meet here are transplants originally from the east coast or other areas/nations. Heck, I meet more non-Californians here than "native" Californians. Also, the various ______-isms simply manifest themselves in different ways, so it's not entirely absent here. But generally, people I run in to here have lived in different areas (different countries even), have been exposed to more different cultures, and the fact that they choose to uproot from their familiar surroundings and move out here from wherever already indicates to me a more open mind. (I'm biased, of course, because I did this once upon a time.)

How did I start with a rant about slanted eyes and end up with a comparison between east coast people and Californians? Eh, I don't know, except that I still associate that kind of attitude with my home town, and by association, broadly, The East Coast. Incidentally, the slanted eyes queries all originated from the east coast--Massachusetts, Virginia, New York, New Haven (plus two queries from the Philippines and Bangalore, where I guess people believe that Asians have slanted eyes. . ..).

Prepping to become a despotic ruler

Ok, S, Yv and Sage Broccoli know about my aspirations to become a despotic ruler. I really need to stop blogging and buckle down and get on with the first part of my five-part plan in order to achieve this hefty goal. (f(x) =1/y, where x=number of blog posts, and y=how much stuff I'm supposed to be doing instead of blogging or trolling around on FB.)

However, yesterday, I spoke with an expert in this field, and he was so positive, that I'm newly inspired and exited again about this for a change and need to document this.

Truth be told, I've been a tad frustrated, b/c the bar is so damn "high" (Ok, to call getting an 800 on the math GRE a "high bar" is a joke for some, I know, but my brain has really atrophied that much. Ten years ago, this would've been the least of my problems), the hoops are so so many, the timeline to attain this ultimate goal is just daunting, and if I'm serious about this, I need to actually rearrange my work schedule and reduce hours so I can drive all the way down to SJState during the middle of the workday and take a few "remedial" courses in despotic regime theory, because my local community college doesn't offer upper level courses in despotic regimes, and I just don't feel like paying $6,000-$7,000 per class to take it at my own university.

Plus my dear friend S thinks that I'm "wasting my life for the next few years" and that I should instead be focusing my energies on finding a girlfriend or husband, because in spite of women's lib and feminism, etc., I guess our ultimate goal in life and joie de vivre is still to find someone you love, marry and perpetuate the gene pool. Humph. If only things were that easy. Not that I don't want to do this or obsess about this from time to time, but I don't necessarily want to plan my life around this either. If it happens it happens, and if it doesn't, well, that's that. But being told things like this makes one reevaluate how much one wants to be a megalomaniac and wonder whether I'm cut out for this vibrant living thing that Yv and Sage Broccoli and I have discussed. It's a lovely concept--to be vibrantly alive rather than merely comfortable and complacent--but just what exactly this entails still eludes me.

My advisor was also much more sanguine about job prospects and opportunities in the field, which was heartening, even if I'm still not sure if both my heart and mind are committed to this idea. But for the time being, I'm going to take a plunge and see.

So next week begins the chaos, the ensuing business (that's busy-ness, not business), and I might change my mind about this and get frustrated again when I find out once again that I don't get stuff like uppersemicontinuous this and that and I've learned that I've forgotten what one does with eigenvectors. Gosh, I'm getting apprehensive just thinking about this. . ..

But yesterday, I was in high spirits about this, so I'm writing this mostly as a reminder to myself for those days where I'm back to dithering about. My advisor gave me some helpful tips about programs to look into, and suggested courses of study that would give me the most options for becoming the leader of a despotic regime. He thinks that since despotic rulers don't make money like lawyers and doctors, no one should really have to pay to study to become one, which is good news. (My secondary goal in life is to keep going to schools without paying for them.) He also thought that given my background, I shouldn't be scared away by the math. (Despotic rulers are very calculating, so it turns out they need a fair amount of math. Surprising, eh?) And much as I would love to go to a top tier school, realistically speaking, I think I need to look at the mid-tier ones. So instead of the usual suspects (yes, everyone aspires to get into MIT, Stanford, Harvard, etc.), he gave me programs that were "pretty good"--still in the top 15, but below the top 5. And if I don't get that elusive 800, I can alway go lower, too.

So I guess I should go study while I'm in high spirits and am sufficiently motivated.

Swoon-worthy things

Ok, there are two things that make me theoretically* swoon. (*theoretically, because I don't actually swoon. I'm more of a gusher, but swooning sounds so much more. . .Elizabethan and grown up and proper. As an aside, swoon should always be italicized, because it just looks more unstable and swoon-like that way.)

One is my Congan drum instructor, who is unfortunately gay, but has a beautiful tenor voice, plays piano beautifully, is very knowledgeable about music, speaks multiple languages, is well-read, writes beautifully, is funny and witty as hell, is both interested and interesting, and is also the nicest, humblest, most unassuming person I've ever met. (I'm sure there is a less-awkward way to write that, but I'm swooning, so please cut me some slack.)

The other is the Takacs Quartet playing Intimate Letters. The first is not a productive swooning endeavor, but thanks to my dear friend Sofiya who has direct access to this quartet's members (she's very powerful like that), my swooning sentiments won't be completely for naught. Although these quartet members have no idea who I am, she is going to tell them that I thought their Janacek was swoon-worthy, because she thinks they will appreciate that.

Isn't it cool that a quartet of that stature that gets so much acclaim and attention from the bigwigs can still appreciate comments about their swoon-worthiness from a random un-bigwig audience member?

My 21 (actually six) demands

Not to abuse my ghettoizing power as a blogger, but while I have the fleeting attention of a certain critic, I wonder if it would be out of bounds for me to present to him my Wishlist for the SF Chron. He can ignore me if he wishes, but I can't not try. :) I've made these requests before, but here is the reader's digest version (I don't want to push my luck that far):

1. I would like to find the music reviews in under 5 clicks from the sfgate homepage. (Last time, it took 12 clicks to find the review I was looking for, because I couldn't spell "Rheingold" properly and I didn't know whether an opera review would fit under "performance", "music and nightlife" or "art".)
2. If I click on the author of a music review, I want to find a page of more reviews by him, instead of his email address (besides which, why would you want to give your readers such easy access to the writers?). You already list their email addresses, replete with a helpful hyperlink, at the bottom, so linking the author attribution at the top of the article to an email address is redundant.
3. Instead of classical music reviews being hidden under "entertainment", I'd like a separate tab--perhaps "arts" or "fine arts"? (Classical music would be even better, but I understand it's out of vogue to give classical music its own heading.)
4. All of those photos of performances you put up to pander to some reader who wants visual stimulation to entice them? Well, I'm a Tufte disciple, so I'm not enticed. More graphics means less content and more scrolling for me. A pretty picture is not going to make me want to read a review more. Thus, off with its head.
5. In lieu of all of the flashy graphics, I'd prefer it if you list the author of the article, since there is usually only one reason I'm ever on the Chron website.
6. When I go to the "Performances" section, currently, the reviews are on the right, with opera way at the bottom, below theatre and dance. If I click on the "more" link, instead of taking me to this empty search page, resulting in more clicks, I would like it to lead to more opera reviews. (This is usually why one clicks on a "more" link--because we want to see more reviews or articles by someone; not because we want to be led to a search page.)

That is all.
Now, back to my usual program. . .

Quote of the day

Said by my choral director, during my voice check: "You shouldn't feel like a slacker. It's not like you sit at home and smoke pot for 5 hours a day."

Hmm. If only he knew. . . On second thought, I don't want him to know anything.

A new way of reviewing new music

Yikes. I don't know anything about this piece or much about Tan Dun to legitimately critique this review by Mr. Joshua Kosman, but it is pretty scathing. He does not mince his words. At all.

He seemed to find the first half pleasant enough. But not so the second half:

Thereafter, though, things soon bogged down. Kenneth Frazelle's Piano Trio, commissioned for the occasion, turned out to be a long and rather shapeless recycling of ideas from Brahms, Tchaikovsky and Ravel. Frazelle's work at least bore the marks of modesty and honesty.

And then,

For truly overweening emptiness, there was Tan Dun's "Elegy: Snow in June," a pointless 25-minute jumble of sounds for cello and four percussionists.

Each of the percussionists . . . had what seemed like several dozen instruments at his disposal - none of which was played for more than five seconds at a time - and cellist Andrés Díaz sat in the middle offering driblets of melody and squeaky interjections. The goal seemed to be to use the sheer profusion of incident to distract listeners from the lack of musical ideas.

I won't critique the writing, since someone elsewhere seems to have taken that up as their niche.

I've read enough reviews by Kosman to know that for the most part, he is a fair reviewer. He knows his stuff. He seems open-minded. Sometimes I feel like he gets carried away with his over-utilization of metaphors, but that's a minor quibble.

Still, I wonder about reviews like this. It's not that I expect reviewers to always like what they listen to. Nor do I think that it is the reviewer's job to help or support artists or performing groups (though I'm sure rave reviews don't hurt). And I certainly don't expect reviewers to gloss over something that is truly bad.

But can music be this bad? Here is a recording of it. (The link doesn't seem to work too well on my computer.)
According to info I found online, Tan Dun's piece is supposed to be an elegy for victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre. Kosman may not have liked it, but such an undertaking sounds very personal and significant to me. It certainly doesn't sound "empty" or "pointless".

I'm not trying to undermine a reviewer's expertise or his job, but part of me wonders whether a review that is this acerbic serves any meaningful purpose. If I go to a performance of this work, even though usually I try not to take reviews at face-value, I or anyone who has read this review will now go into the performance with a bias.

Could he have just said something to the effect of, "this wasn't my cup of tea" or "the concept was nice, but it failed in the execution" instead of calling it overweening? What about the piece was so vacuous and pompous? Were the themes not developed enough? Was it just so "out there" it didn't work? Too gimmicky? Too "Eastern" sounding?

I wish that given how critical he is, there was more room for elaboration. While I grant that reviewers have the right to write scathing criticisms and have a right to their opinions, negative or otherwise, I do feel that a) because experiencing music is somewhat subjective (True, no good musician would dispute the greatness of Beethoven, Bartok, etc., but most music runs the gamut in terms of quality); b) new music already has enough "barriers to entry" for many of his potentially concertgoing readers to "get" than say, Bach or Brahms; and c) unlike a well-known piece by any of these aforementioned "B" composers, my guess is that many readers may not be familiar with Tan Dun's piece; that when one writes a review about pieces that he feels this strongly about, more details are in order.

Such an explanation would be much more useful to readers (and not to mention, to Tan Dun, if he reads this review) than say, "This work is feces and serves no purpose."

Not that Kosman's job is to champion new music, but his review also doesn't help quell the fears of new music-phobes who might be further dissuaded from attending future concerts or taking risks with this genre.

I admit to being this new music-phobe at times. I've definitely become more interested in contemporary music over the last few years, particularly since joining an ensemble whose mission is to promote such works. But this "interest" extends mostly to "brand name" composers who are hardly "new" anymore. I am also open to new things if the price is right, but I confess that when I did see this last program for the Music @ Menlo series, at the price point they were offering this new music concert, I wasn't willing to "risk" it, given that the only name I recognized was Tan Dun's.

I know that is closed-minded of me, but after reading Kosman's review, I'm not left with much incentive to open it up much.

Witnessing the process of making music

Last night, my friends let me sit in on one of their rehearsals of Mendelssohn's Piano Trio in D minor. Wow. Except one former professional musician, none of them are professionals, and all haven't really played in years, but they sounded great together. I couldn't just pick up my violin and play like that. The pianist was just something else. Prior to last night, I had never heard her play, but had strong suspicions that she was pretty good, b/c she has a grand piano. Her part is at least 10.3 times as hard as the other two parts. She was amazing.

I know that listening to amateur musicians rehearse and work through passages doesn't excite most of my musician friends, professional, elitist, or otherwise, but what a treat to be able to hear the process of music being created. So often, what we hear is the final product, which, as a (sortof) performer, I know is also itself a work in progress. It evolves, and even if you play/sing the same thing three times, each performance is slightly different. Still, what you present is theoretically a polished final product. Never perfect (well, at least speaking for myself), and can always improve, if you had more time, but a final product all the same. You rarely get to hear a work-in-progress, in which the performers deliberate over this and that dynamic, tempo, and other minutiae. True, I get a sufficient dose of this in my own rehearsals, but it's quite different when you're an outside observer, because you get to listen with an undistracted ear, and you're not immersed in the process.

I love live concerts put on by professional musicians in venues with perfectly engineered acoustics, and 90 percent of my live listening experience is of this sort, but sometimes I just prefer music as I heard it last night. Impromptu. Mid-rehearsal, before everything is 100 percent polished. Music as it undergoes the stages of transformation. Plus the music somehow sounds more significant, because it is being played by people you know really well. It's Mendelssohn but mediated through a familiar filter. I almost felt like I was peering into their soul somewhat, since I wasn't supposed to be there, and you don't take that sort of thing lightly.

The best part is that this all happened within a stone's throw from my apartment. Isn't it nice to have such talented friends so close by so I can get my Mendelssohn fix?

Closing another chapter

Well, I think my parents just officially moved, b/c I can't get through on their old line. Phooey. The most important phone number for almost half of my lifetime--the number I called when I felt homesick; the number I called whenever I needed more $ during college; the number I called when I finished my finals, graduated, got into grad school, got a new job or quit my old job; the number I called whenever I returned to the U.S.; the number I called to "check in" with my parents every few days when I drove across the country alone at 23; heck, the number I still call once a week or so--is no longer.

And I can't sleep, b/c I'm wallowing in maudlin sentiments (as you can see). I have never actually lived there long enough to legitimately call it home, but there is still that twinge of wistfulness. My brothers, on the other hand--particularly the youngest one, who has spent roughly half of his sentient childhood there--have both lived there for extended periods. I lived there for a year when I did my year "abroad", plus spent many summers and winters there.

In my case, "home" where I spent the bulk of my childhood is a no-longer-extant house in a suburb near NYC. The house that TT and I spent the bulk of our childhood was dozed down several years after we moved out. I have some fond memories of the house and the immediate neighborhood, but given that the physical structure is gone, our former neighbors and friends no longer live there, the old hangout places are gone, the place no longer feels like home. In fact, the last time I drove by my old street (four years ago? Wow. Has it been that long?), I felt an odd emptiness. The place we called home for 14 years no longer exuded that familiar warmth. It was a bit unsettling.

But home is more of a state of mind than a physical location per se. It is a place where your parents still have that silly vase you made back in fourth grade. It is a place where you celebrate important occasions and holidays. A place where traditions and rituals live on. A place where you find the Christmas tree still decked out in the same ornaments and lights from 20, 30 years ago.

Both mentally and emotionally, "home"--and when I say home, I mean 実家, which doesn't have a neat English translation, but the literal translation is "true home"; essentially, it is where one's family/parents are. It's what I used to call "home home" in college, for lack of better word.--has gradually shifted some 6700 miles westward, across the Pacific, from the penumbrae of NYC, to the penumbrae of 東京, where my parents lived, well, until yesterday.

My parents' latest home was in 横浜、in a wonderfully convenient location. 11 minutes by JR to 横浜 station proper, 3 minutes (or walking distance) to the 横浜中華街、and within 15 minutes from some of the best shopping to be done. It was also very convenient to 東京 and other transportation hubs.

The other thing that is significant about this place (my second "home") is that I associate it strongly with my (re)connection with Japan. Since I was born and raised in the U.S., Japan is not home in the sense of home country, nor do I feel any political allegiance to it, but given my family and friends there, I feel very connected to the place. It's not home per se, but I feel very at home when I am there. Over the course of the past 16 years or so, I went from feeling like a complete outsider/foreigner when I first visited my family in their new home, to living, breathing like a "local". Granted, I never stay in Japan for extended periods, but now, whenever I visit, it feels home-ish enough that I feel equally in my element whether I'm here or over there. It's quite a liberating feeling. When I'm over there, the Celsius, the kilometers, the kilograms, the 24 hour clock system--it all makes sense. I have no idea what 24 degrees Celsius converts to in Fahrenheit, but when I'm over there, I know what it feels like. My body and brain automatically make the switch. Thus the 横浜 home is also where I reconnected with my heritage, roots, discovered this other side of me, reforged my identity to incorporate this new part of me, etc.

In some ways, the move feels somewhat like I'm closing a chapter of my life. It also marks a new stage for my parents, who have officially become "empty nesters", with the last of my brothers just having moved out.

The new 家 is closer to the ocean, but farther away from 東京. More inconvenient in that sense, but also much closer to 鎌倉, which is one of my favorite cities, and a good place to get one's 12th century Japan fix, when going to 京都 is not a possibility. Hmm. Maybe not a bad trade off after all.