:: groupthink ::

:: Sunday, July 20, 2003 ::

one of the most overwhelming feelings i have about being back in korea after 25 years is how fortunate i am. for so many reasons. i spent the day yesterday riding in the back of my brother-in-law's van, riding 145 km/h on paved but intensely bumpy roads from inchon to umsong, where my father is buried. and we paid homage to his ashes, with apples and melons, dried fish and wine. we bowed before his ashes and i tried to make sense of the internal reverence while kneeling on a garfield/odie mat. my father is buried in a state cemetery, so everywhere you can see there are burial plots. the plots are built into the mountain side, so driving to mid-mountain, where my father's ashes are, is like climbing a pyramid.

after the ceremony, i walked the way back down the mountain while some of my relatives drove down to wait for me. it is breathtaking beauty that confronts you. korean magnolias in full bloom. rows of quite gravestones, climbing toward the heavens.

next we drove at full speed to ansan, the village i was born. and we went to my uncle's house and unexpectly found a massive house. it felt like a hacienda combined with an italian villa. my uncle has rows and rows of grapes and corn. a beautiful plum tree that i climbed as he laughed. another uncle took a photograph as i picked some of that delicious fruit. the house was vast. 7 bedrooms and high ceilings with ornate ceilings. of course, it is much cheaper to keep such a house in korea, especially since one does not need to furnish it. however, they did have western-style beds in the bedrooms upstairs.

we walked along the gravel road down to my grandfather's house, the house in which i was born and in which my father died. we walked along the rice fields, green like bursting buds of spring. along the corn taller than me. we walked along a narrow dirt path, potholed and muddy.

and when we got to the house, it was what i was expecting. it has two rooms: a narrow expanse for the kitchen and dining area and another narrow expanse for meeting and sleeping. there is no furniture and the walls are old and dirty, decorated with 30 year-old black-and-white photographs combined to fit in one frame. but the moment i walked in i remembered it. i remember that this is the place i lived, the place i played. i felt safe here and this is the place i had remembered from the recesses of my dreams. when i think of the term shack, this is the house that comes to mind. i feels like it is a relic from another time. and i hated to leave it. i hadn't realized how much i had missed this safe little house.

and i hadn't realized how much i had missed my grandfather, the man who raised me after my father died and my mother ran off. the man whose son died after a 9-month struggle with cancer and his daughter in law left him with 5 children. a man whose wife died a year later from cancer. a man who found himself forced to give up the two youngest because he just could not afford them.

"i'm sorry we were so poor," he told me through his tears. "i have been missing you a lot."

my twin sister and i have been searching for our family for 3 1/2 years. when i heard they had been found two weeks ago, i was euphoric and scared. when i met my mother for the first time in 27 years, i was uncertain and i felt she was a stranger. when i saw my sister, she embraced me like the long-lost sister i was, but i still could not remember her. when i saw my grandfather, i remembered and i could not stop crying.

"don't cry, don't cry," he told me, even as the tears streamed down his face.

it was not until i had regained my compsure did i turn around to face the relatives who had gathered that day -- some driving for 5 hours to get there -- and realized that the whole room was in tears. aunts, cousins and child after child. and then we all laughed.

that night my brother in law drove my sister and i and a photographer to our hotel in seoul. the photographer, who is along because i'm writing a story about the reunion for a newspaper, complained about her room being too small so she upgraded to a double. my sister and i went to our room and felt a bit guilty. it felt too big. it had to be larger than my grandfather's entire house.

i think about what my grandfather gave up, what he received in his life. he has lost most of his teeth and eats his rice in a bowl of hot water. he chuckles softly as he watches the room fill up with his sons and daughter and his grandchildren and great grandchildren. he has lost much of his hearing so he speaks softly and we must yell to be heard. he has lived long enough to see his son's daughters return. he has worn away his joints from a lifetime of working on cargo ships so he walks with two wooden canes. he has a heart so full and deep that he can move a room to tears.


:: Courtnay 7:22 PM [+] ::
...

one of the things i find myself doing almost every time i get here is reaquainting myself with power. i mean reacquainting in the sense of redefining it, yielding it, wielding it, and being in awe of it.

i spent the past few days in mumbai - at the home of family friends in a section of town called bandra east. their particular neighborhood is called Kalanagar- home to a man by the name of Bal Thackeray. this man is essentially the head of the Shiv Sena party- a fairly conservative Hindu nationalist group that won elections and ran the city of Mumbai in the mid to late nineties and also wielded power across the country. Mr. Thackeray no longer serves the city in any official capacity- yet outside his residential gates sits a small garrison of city police officers. their shanty sandbagged fixture has become semi-permanent, you can peek in through the grill between the tin roofed structure and the sandbags to see towels/ mirrors/ shaving kits etc., what you'd expect to find in a place where people are stationed weeks at a time. the fact that this man technically has no "power" but has such a show of force outside his house- funded unflinchingly by the tax payer is always powerful to see.

driving in any major metro (perhaps chennai and mumbai are the best/worst case examples) is an exercise in assertive/aggressive power. there are a few dozen (at best) of intersections in chennai for example where the lights really matter and people yield accordingly. more often than not, the change in the flow of traffic across an intersection from one perpendicular to another is a somewhat elegant and at times barbaric dance between humans and machines. if you were to wait for traffic to slow or for someone to wave you in- well you might as well pick up a Vedic text and grab a snickers bar (cuz its gonna be a while). it starts with a sort of collective gutteral growl from the traffic waiting to cross. then in fits and starts one auto rickshaw after a small car after a scooter after a bicycle begin to nose/ lean into the intersection. the cross traffic slowly begins to bend around and continue in their direction. the potential energy in the cross traffic unwinds further and noses further into the intersection, pinching the arterial from one direction. seeing this- the opposite side yielding begins to do the same- nudging and squeezing. during this squeeze, there are some daring attempts by members of the dominant stream to squeeze through the decreasing gap- often times it works, but sometimes it doesn't. i've been in vehicles where a bicycle who was trying to shoot the gap failed and leaned across our front bumper to make it across as my driver prodded his way across, or where we were at the edge of our phalanx and had a motorcycle screech to a stop inches away from my windshield. if you could see it from a suspended camera over the center of the intersection it would probably be a very organic thing to watch, resembling the ways energy coarses through the human body- reminiscent of some video you saw in your high school biology class. anwyay it ends when the potential energy is completely unwound and the flow of traffic is altereed in the perendicular- meanwhile the vehicles from the newly repressed sides have already begun their encroachment.

as an Indian who can speak with an American accent- there are certain automatic assumptions about you that can work in your favor to get things done. you can of course play stupid and get away with certain things, but you can also come across as erudite, wealthy and lets face it- in some way- powerful when it comes to tackling otherwise bureaucratic matters. in a few occasions, people aware of these potential exploitations and are consequently weary of the batch of us. these bureaucrats go out of their way to make sure there is some semblance of egalitarian socialism left in their administration of the country by making sure we wait our turn. the key to the execution in these cases is a level of comfort with this innate power. almost everytime i'm here i find myself taking on some small infrastructure issue or another when it comes to my father's welfare. this time it was the phone company. even though he switched to a privatized provider, the field agents that respond to support requests at times act like they are still being paid by the government, and do what comes so naturally to government officials here- deflect responsibility. i usually find that a face to face conversation (in my most American english- without revealing my ability to speak tamil or even hindi) regarding some sort of customer care issue- will usually get me escalated to either a representative of the organization that exists for "special cases" or with an executive. the cold hard fact is that if a native Tamil speaking colleague of mine went to the same receptionist, she'd give him - the "call our so-and-so number" routine. with some rapid-fire english, and my proclivity to wait stoically in any lobby, within about 20 minutes i can overhear most receptionists say (in tamil) "theres an overseas guy here- and he looks ticked off- who can we get to talk to him".

theres also the sticky issue of domesticity and getting somewhat comfortable wielding the power in a household over other human beings who are there to help you do things that you don't want to/ have time to/ or can't. the western sensibilities of power around the house are probably so foreign because we a) have to have a ridiculous amount of money to know what its like b) have grown up in a structure without it- and consequently perceive people with "help" as snobs/ etc. etc. c) have some notion that all people are created equal and by not wielding domestic power over someone we are somehow living that altruism out. well in India- much of the middle class has at least a human dishwasher who pops in once a day if not (in ascending order) driver/ cook/ nannies and (space/ wealth permitting) live-in "help". a few trips ago i remember trying to tear down the barriers of class and power with swings of a sledgehammer as if i was standing on the berlin wall. i'd try to invite our driver to sit for tea on a couch/ or have a long coversation with our cook- and get him/ her to sit at the dining table. i couldn't for the life of me understand the idea that "there are certain things that just aren't done". i've seen Gosford Park- i know the upstairs downstairs drill- but i thought i could be different. this time, i was part of some personnel changes at my father's residence- and the only way i could do it was in this rather distant/ cold/ and somewhat powerful way. the neighbors etc., seemed completey comfortable with my decisions/ actions etc., and i could almost see a smile somewhere behind their eyes- as if i was finally coming around. i didn't know whether to accept this furtive congratulations or be ashamed.

power is amazing. its a bit like playdoh, it has that odd sort of smell to it that some of us will never be comfortable with, and others will want to taste in every possible color. India reminds you that at its core, power is just pure energy, its what we do with it that makes it beautiful or ugly.


:: h 11:04 AM [+] ::
...

being in a place like India constantly redefines the edges of your definitions of irony. lemme give you a synopsis of some of the stories in pubs here. this is a country with an unbelievable amount of money. there was a story in this morning's Weekend Business Standard- titled "Have money, wills spend"- by Soumik Sen chronicling how the new business majarajas are spending 6 figure amounts for their new must-haves. the reporter profiled the plight of the louis vitton showrooms- where new goat-skinned handbags for 128,000 rupees- ($2845 U.S.)- are leaving the shelves in flocks, faster from the New Delhi store than in Europe. the batch of 300 bags earmarked for India sold out two months in advance. Sen also used Corum's new Admiral's club pink gold watch as an example which retails for 1,250,000 rupees ($27,777US) . the company expects to sell 15-20 watches a month in India, their cheapest watch comes at 80,000 Rs ($177US). our prime minister's motorcade is getting a rather drastic makeover. they're switching from the tried and true Indian workhorse- the Ambassador- to an armored version of BMW's 7 series vehicles. the fleet of 4 (3 decoys) will begin carting the prime minister around later this year. thats whats in the offical record, heard on the street are stories of extravagance that boggle the mind. spending time at a hip new local super-model hangout in Mumbai can set you back 8000rs ($177US) for a couple of beers and perhaps a bottle of wine. getting in - is near impossible because of the crowds ready to pay that kinda price. the most posh restaurants and hotels have rates listed in USD, and native as well as Non-Resident Indians are happy to comply and play at this level of obscene wealth. the latest mercedes SLK editions are selling out in advance and the evidence is on the streets- all leading you to question the notion of a recession. the recent IPO of Maruti (formerly a venture with Suzuki) drew 300,000 small investors into the hurlyburly stock market. the money is here- and not even so hidden.

simultaneously,there was an interesting piece a week and a half ago- the cover story for India Today magazine about the "Robbercracy" - regarding bureacractic corruption being at a new high. it highlights the extent to which cases are brought against individuals by several anti-corruption units in the government, but how less than 1 percent actually result in any action against the individual because the system has become so graft stricken that it insulates the wrong-doers. it mentioned international measures and surveys of corruption- from Transparency International and the World Economic Forum and how poorly the country fared. the article had several special pull outs profiling individual ministers- how they had been caught with hundreds of thousands times the value of their yearly salaries in the form of homes/ land/ small businesses/ vehicles/ jewellery etc. and how many of them are still in business at their official posts even after these findings. if you think the US criminal justice system is sluggish- you ain't seen nothin'. there are new degrees to which you can procrastinate your fate in this land. the article outlined details of people caught in 1984- whose case was only heard in 94 and who have just been scheduled to make their first appearance in court in 2003.
a small business trying to open a factory here has to apply for 48 different licenses (creating that many opportunities for kickbacks) 65 different officials have to "inspect" the facilities during the year (creating yet more opportunities for graft). the sad part is that there is a certain level of immunization that has happened to people here when it comes to issues of corruption. they're hardened to it. articles like these are relatively easy to do and are only shocking to someone who is an outsider.

the same issue had a small piece on the village of Kachariadih in the state of Bihar where an astonishing 90 percent of the population (including 50 children) are crippled. the water containing 8 percent fuoride (where the legal limit is 1.5%) might have something to do with it. most of the children twisted limbs and bent backs. as widely publicized as the plight of this village is, there really hasn't been much intervention by the gov. to relocate the villagers or clean up the water. its not a matter of throwing money at the probem, the Indian gov. actually spends 4 billion rupees a year on poverty- its getting that money down into the hands of the people w/o sticky fingers between the head office and the impovrished thats the problem.

the anecdotes on the street. are much worse. rickshaw drivers n chenai (which are vaults of information on the transportation sector) tell you that it doesn't take a genius to figure out how systemic the fraud is in public transit. every bus in chennai leans dangerously to one side during rush hours because its carrying at least 2-3x occupancy, and there are people literally hanging on with a couple of fingers on a rail and perhaps a toe on the bottom stair. how can these buses declare losses every year? the answer is that much of the money the ticket conductor takes in - flies into his own pocket- and is sometimes split with the driver. its a coveted position that bring in such loot- so there is a huge bribe necessary in order to get such a post. so to get a job that techically pays very little, you have to bribe someone with an arm and a leg- because everyone knows that can make back the amount of the bribe in a few months of "unofficial" work. ask any college student how ruthless the graft is in higher education and they'll tell you the tales of their families selling the farm for an admission fee. these fees don't have anything to do with the actual tuition costs etc., we're just talkin' incredibly large sums of money that have to pass under the table- off the books- to get you in the door. screw how smart you are, you better be smart enough to know what that special number is. colleges are popping up like weeds outside chennai- and when you look at their business models- it makes perfect sense. lets forget the large sums- ask someone what it costs to have your child delivered to you after birth. this is probably the most insidious type of graft i've heard about (and i should also say the least substantiated- with a potential of being an urban legend). when the nurse comes to the waiting area and tells a family its a boy, they're expecting 500rs, when they say its a girl, they're expecting 300, if not there is a chance that some vindicitive individuals will switch your child with another one- as a protest to your ignorance.

there is a feeling of helplessness and hope when you see all this going on. the helplessness has to do with the feeling of insignificance, that your individual effort to fight any of these things is futile. the hope on the other hand comes from seeing that there are people managing not only to survive in this type of system- but actually improve their lot in one way or another. the students mentioned earlier - whose parents had to sell the farm in order for the admission fees - are making a drastic leap in earning potential and level of education. somewhere in the chaos seems to exist a pattern.

:: h 10:24 PM [+] ::
...

yesterday was an emotionally draining shoot. the morning was spent at a place called the banyan - its a place that takes care of destitute mentally ill women. the women are called in by volunteers/ police/ etc. and usually picked up off the streets in some horrendous shape- i don't really wanna get into the details- but i think you can pretty much guess. they're given medical attention/ followed by psychiatric evaluations/ treatments/ medications/ then encouraged to pick up some semblance of a vocational skill if they are interested- and eventually some of them regain the ability to talk about their past- deal with it and become reunited with their families. it was a challenging shoot for one thing- because i wanted to protect the privacy of these women- so short of one small group that were knitting in the crafts room, i was trying to shoot/ hands and feet/ backs of heads/ etc. the hallways were crowded with women lying down/ or squatting/ talking to themselves etc. its just what you'd expect at a facility that allows people who are mentally ill some freedom- but as bizarre as it all is- you realize that this location- that houses and feeds them - is a godsend. the alternative for these women is unimaginable.
later in the afternoon- i travelled- minus the camera- to a home for the mentally retarded. talk about a double whammy- we're talking about 35-50 kids with varying degrees of mental retardation varying in age from 5- 56. it was tremendous. the siva shakti center is spearheaded by a woman who just seems to have an enormous heart. shes had some social work training and some official qualifications in mental retardation studies, but nothing could prepare you for what she shows you. she shows off her students - and if you're squeemish about the retarded- seeing groups of them in a room, getting hugged by some at random times, and shaking a lot of hands- stay away. sher rattles off their ailments/ temperments/ how they came/ how they've improved. they stand up and begin reciting prayers or random factoids they are happy to talk about- its totally surreal. one is autistic who can tell you the RAGA of any classical Indian song even though he nor his family have been exposed to te genre. the lady has adopted a prematurely born Hinu boy who came into the world in a uterus w/ no amniotic fluid, so hes what you'd call a micro birth i guess. lets put it this way- hes 15 years old and you can carry him like a 22 month old- except for that he has all the hair on his back that you'd expect from an adolescent. she's also the legal guardian for a christian girl who at 10 years old weighs more than 110 pounds- has no sight/ very little hearning and grabs onto her wicker mat like linus does his blanket. its just outright intense.

this morning i spent at a panchayat (group of hamlets) led by a man named Elango. hes essentially putting some elements of Gandhian philosophy into practice by creating a micro-economy. he grew up in this village/ got an education as an engineer and worked briefly as a scientist. after hearing about caste riots in his ancestral town, he headed back- to try and make a difference. he was elected five years ago as the panchayat president and has been working forward ever since. when taking an initial survey he realized that these village had amazing consumption power even though they had very little. most villagers were literally selling everything they owned over time to facilitate the bare necesseties that they would need to get by. Elango calculated that there were ways to turn the have nots into producers by becoming more efficient with what the land already produced. employment was being destroyed by mechanization- but rather than fight that- he figured out new sources of revenue that could create jobs. for example rice production. land owners farm the rice with tractors and harvesters- employing very few people- they then ship the crop out for the rice to be threshed out and then the village ends up buying the rice back from the city/ or wherever its manufactured. in this little micro-utopia-in-the-making they've set up prototypes of the least expensive machinery required to manufacture the crop locally- and sell it at a cheaper price. multiply this by dahl/ ground nut/ etc. etc. and you've the beginnings of a tiny economy that is creating goods and services that it can trade among its own members- a notion that the country used to be very familiar with- apriori british occupation which brought about greater centralization of efforts.
hes essentially working off of a Gandhi quote- paraphrase- [the problems of society will not be cured by mass production but by the production by the masses]


:: h 9:44 PM [+] ::
...

on monday of this wk- man it seems like longer- i was at a rural hospital in tamil nadu run my Ms. Sylvia Wright- a subject for one of my little video vignettes. shes a brit who arrived in India 22 years ago and just decided to stay and help. what started out as a small medical van running through 6 villages a wk, has now turned into a 220 bed hospital with a blood lab/ x ray facility/ surgery center and outpatient unit that sees more than 80,000 patients a year. its truly remarkable the amount of work they get done, the type of cases they get and the level of care they are able to deliver. nearby the charitable trust that funds 1/4 of ms. wright's hospital activities, also supports a live-in school she has for deaf children. there are about 200 kids of all sizes, surrounded in classes by their peers- learning about the world- and happy to be alive. adjacent to this complex is a voc tech school for some impovrished youth- teaching them everything from basic electrical work to tailoring/ embroidery and handicrafts. i've seen the school for the deaf a few times before because my father's non-profit donates a bit to it etc., but seeing the sum total is pretty inspiring in what a single individual can do- if they just work at it.

day before yesterday i documented some of the work of ASSCOD - an org that creates and supports SHGs- self help groups in a couple of rural districts in Tamil Nadu. for those unfamiliar with SHGs- its all the rage these days. groups f 15-20 women get together in a village and save as little as a rupee a day- the combined funds are placed in a collective account and the women can borrow from the group for their individual needs- paying the group back with anywhere from 8 to 25 percent interest. (you're probably thinking with rates like that why not go to a bank. most of these women have no collateral- nada- zip- zilch- banks aren't the most cooperative bunch in these cases.- not to mention in rural India- the fact is that bank officers often require under the table kickbacks- without any guarantee the loan will ever be approved). some of the stories i heard from women in these SHGs about their financial lives before the presence of these collectives was just gut wrenching- what they struggle for in order to get by- how the culture of debt just robs them blind, etc. etc. the successes these SHGs bring about is equally as impressive. we're talkin' senses of security, independence, pride, confidence etc. etc. i met with a couple of groups that had invested some of their funds into small microbusinesses- making candles/ tailoring/ making incese things etc. the stories of the treasurer- talking about how she is the sole provider for her family now- and how she wishes her husband would get off his ass now- were inspiring/ funny/ sad- all at once. when i arrived at these incredibly small villages i was greeted with quite a bit of fanfare- my arrival had been schedule and people had been told etc. one group- a village of middle cast but still poor people tried to give me these two beautiful shawls that they had purchased somewhere. this was near the beginning of the shoot and i was already verklempft. i told them - as politely as possible in my sorry- ass tamil as well as through much more precise tamil through a facilitator that i was very thankful/ but that i didn't need these things/ they are working very hard to save money/ and that they should keep such beautiful things for new births or weddings for members in their group. at my initial hesitation- a few were put off/ after hearing my explanation, i think the smiles told me they understood. (shooting with different dialects- boy- thats a blast- because colloquialisms that you think you get/ you don't... and when you do get them- you start remembering that these are people with senses of humor/ and that language - whatever language - is a beautiful thing)

:: h 9:40 PM [+] ::
...

so i've just spent the last couple of days in a place that can't be found on google- its a remote village called vasudevamputt- in the south of India- the closest town kinda place is about 20 kilometers away - a place called tiruvanamalai. i usually try and pop my head in or out here when i'm back on spaceship INJA... its a very nice reality check etc. the connection is that my grandfather used to be a priest at this temple - so my father's generation have kinda become some primary sponsors etc. the big whoop over in this neck of the woods is that the temple was going through whats called a kumbabishekam- its essentially a consecration to recharge the spiritual power of a temple. its supposed to happen about once every 12 years- don't ask why- and this one is about 6 years behind schedule (or 6 years ahead - depending on how much of a slacker u r). i learned some cool little practical vedic factoids that i'd like to document some place. for starters apparently the dieties are yanked off their platforms, the foundation is totally dug up and then a special brew of ayurvedic spices that only a handful of priests know the contents of is mashed into a pasty substance down beneath the resting place of the idols. the idols are mounted back on there- there is a super prayer of sorts with a large gathering of priests, considering its kinda like a first prayer because the physical representation has just been through a traumatic event- and so theres this big fest.

of course the thing that caught my attention while compiling this explanation was the secret ingredients etc. etc. its actually out of a very practical reason - to have this event happen. somewhere a millenia or so- some vedic priests had figured out the secret to keeping a statue's immortality- treat the ground beneath it, check the root systems, destroy any fungi etc., kind of a bob vila "this old temple" show in the making don't ya think?

part of the rituals include homams- lots of them. these are essentially sacred pits of fire around which priests spend a serious amount of time chanting the heck out of the place. not only are they trying to get into the good graces of the forces of the sun / and fire, but also creating a force unto itself through the frequency of their sounds etc. so i also learned that the sacred fires are sacred because they ALSO have a list of secret ingredients besides wood and ghee. i was kinda given a bit of a supporting role in some of the ceremonies- essentially being a keeper of the flame. there were about 9 fires going at once, and while the priests were busy chanting and pouring ghee- it was upto me and this other guy to keep everything stoked. there were also times where i had my hands on the secret stuff- we're talkin' dried twigs, some nuts, some dirt some dung, some camphor - and much more stuff. the ratio is apparently important, besides that- the whole concotion is supposed to emit a type of smoke which is better than st. john's wort. i was around this smoke for a few hours over the last couple of days- and i can say that it stings the heck out of your eyes, but you do have this wierd feeling that its soaking into you- but not like the cigarrete smoke kinda way... anyway. thats that.


:: h 8:29 AM [+] ::
...

did a shoot yesterday about a place called the Sornnammal Educational Trust working in Chennai. they essentially offer financial support to school children througout the south of India- a couple of years ago, they bought an entire school up, reinvested in the teaching and physical infrastructure and embarked on a bit of a social science experiment as well.
they have about 215 kids from the kindergarten to the 8th grade in the particular school i visited. - with a teacher ratio that california school systems would be jealous of- the largest class i saw was about 24.. the smallest about 6. the interesting deal about this place is that more than a 1/4 of the kids are on full scholarships because they come from the slums neighboring the school. all the kids get your basic education + yoga/karate/music etc. - stuff that you'd only see here at a more expensive private school, cetainly not the overcrwded public schools.
the trustee that i interviewed finds the integration of diff. socioeconomic classes one of the keys to the school's success. not only are the kids learning from each other- everything from improving their street slang because they want to get along with other kids- to mellowing out an aggression they may be used to from home- but they are also rising to match their peers. a more important element is the amount of parent counseling the school does. parents of the kids from the impovrished areas are met with and spoken to once or twice a week by either a teacher or a principal- trying to make sure the parents continue to believe in the value of education. the principal told me that during the monsoons, when the flooding makes it impossible to live in some of the huts, and beneath some of the tents- the school has even gone so far as to open up its inner courtyard to the families of attending children as a safe heaven from the high waters. how many pta associations can you say have that kind of impact on the families of their children?
the last interview i did was with the mother of a child who lives under one of these tarps on the street. besides the astonishing fact that they have been under that tarp since get this- 1969, its also sad to find out that she busts ass as a garbage picker througout the streets of chennai for a whopping 30-50rupees per day. thats about 75cents to a buck ten for those doin' the math... based on about 1-15 kilos of trash that shes able to collect.

more from the wild and wooly world of do-gooding to come.
:: h 7:08 PM [+] ::
...

something cool that u should know in case u r ever in changhi airport- terminal 1- the slightly more local of the terminals- have these little IR stations sponsored by HP which give u a free connection online. if you don't bring your laptop- no worries- the net cafes will allow you to climb on for a nominal fee. they also have wireless access throughout different areas of the airport for a small fee. no heavy password protected firewalls- just a green wall- your credit card is the key to get your through.

the Indian customs procedure is something that mustn't escape comment. since i'm here to shoot non-profits and so forth, i brought a decent camera along. as you get off the plane, and past immigration- the clowns at anna airport make you put your carry-on luggage through an x-ray machine. keep in mind that we have had no chance to interact with any other humans than the ones on the plane - especially conidering we were thoroughly screened in Singapore at the very gate of our aircraft. this check exists for no other reason than to screen for electronic devices- as soon as one is detected, a pune is barked at to mark your bag with a chalk letter. meanwhile your checked luggage is heading through the same procedure- allowing me to watch the wonders of the turning luggage carousel for 25 minutes. i went to the first customs officer - and told him that i had a video camera and a laptop that i planned to take back with me and that i was looking for the paperwork to declare it. he told me to head for the door. the people at the door of course see the B on my camera bag and tell me to get back in line with the declaration folks. once there- i make my case again. this time, the guy looks me up and down, and each time i inist on paperwork - he gets a bit more disappointed. he asks to see my return ticket- which i show him and then he rips off the tiniest corner of my customs form and makes me hand write on the back that i intend on bringing my laptop and camera back with me on the 16th. that note wasn't stapled to my passport, it was just handed to some agent at the door- and thats that.

aahh to be home again.

tis about 6am here... so the streets are starting to wake up to the gentle beeps and giant horns of traffic passing by. intermingled are odd warbling birds, snappy lizards that make a tapping sound, and the most odd sets of chimes you can hear on living room clocks- marking the time. i saw an interesting program on the discovery channel about how elephants have an infrasound communication system where they can transmit signals a few miles away to each other during the day, and that at dawn and dusk when the temperature change is the greatest between the ground and about 25 feet above it- there is some sort of layer of air which helps carry these signals for several MILES between elephants.

speaking of noise, seems the rage also these days is for people to have sounds on their cars indicating when they are in reverse. i swear, last night i couldn't have wished more for a simple beeping sound- think cell phone rings- at a much higher volume- and much cheesier selections of tunes- and now you're gettin' the picture.

right then,
time to be quiet.


:: h 11:54 AM [+] ::
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Is the little things that let you know you are somewhere closer to home-

when a distant uncle greets you at the airport as if you were his own son,
when u can slish slosh an idea in the car ride home in 4 languages and laugh at the jokes in each one,
when even a single cotton sheet becomes unnecessary to sleep under...

can someone tell me why the snippy staff of Cathay Pacific have to wake a human up at 3am- considering you got on the flight at 130am - and shove food in front of your face. it completely knocked me off the 25mg of sominex i had decided to employ in efforts to sleep on the flight. can't forgive them for that one.

hong kong airport looked totally dead by the way- given it was pretty early in the morning, but there were entire sections of wings in the two terminals i saw that had absolutely no one- the only reason it looked odd was how many bathrooms in those wings seemed "out of service" and how the drinking fountains in those sections of the airport had neat little covers on them- locking them out of comission. that didn't seem like a practice a busy airport would engage in daily. meanwhile outside on the streets of downtown a few hundred thousand protestors gathered to criticize the local- and mainland sympathetic government's proposal to change the city's quasiconstitution by allowing a law alleged to be an infringement on human and civil rights.

met a couple of interesting blokes in singapore on my trip here- i pooled my left luggage with theirs as we headed right out on tour le manicured' number two to the "island of sentosa". its not as good as the other free tour- the one that includes a boat ride through singapore's downtown, but its atleast an escape for 2 hours. on an 8 hour + layover- these things begin to matter. the island of sentosa- is a very manicured version of a resort/ park- a place where you can get around by monorail/ bright buses/ or take paved paths that say "jungle trail". most Indians on the tour were in awe of the finely combed beach we were dropped at for 15 minutes. it was a bit surreal when we realized an entire high school class had shown up - to have what looked like "official fun" day. they were in groups of 10 or so, doing group building exercises- like forming a human cat-track on the ground and passing a heavy bag over each other's bodies and so forth. every once in a while, we'd hear lovely little cheers of spirit from these ebullient youth- a sight most of the Indians on the tour found worthy of recording through the video features of their tiny digital cameras being smuggled back home. (more on customs and smuggling later) most of the westerners were kinda tripped out i think- wondering if there was some sinister side to this pleasantville.

anyway- both the Indian guys with me were of course stereotypically IT guys. one was coming back to India after three months in a province north of beijing, where his work at Johnson Controls (at the client site- first ever foreign auto plant (VW)) had stationed him. hes been living on bachelor food for three months- consisting mostly (according to him) of rice and pringles. the purpose of his trip to India is to accompany his wife and infant on their journey back with him. the other guy also had a pretty interesting story- he was leaving san jose and returning to India for good- to be near his parents in bangalore. he had requested and received a transfer from HP. its an idea that made eyebrows rise almost everytime he mentioned it to anyone. i think i was a bit jealous of his courage to execute on something so admirably dutiful but simultaenously questioning his sanity some. he figured it was time to settle down and get married, and even though he went through the cycles of US-IT life- transitioning through from the Toyota Corolla to the Camry and driving very fast in a rented Maxima on a road trip to the grand canyon with his buddies- he just didn't feel that it was the place to begin that phase of his life. go figure.

also sat next to a guy on the tour named amir khan- a rather passionate home-video - point at everything and shoot it while my hand moves in random directions kinda guy, who owns 4 of the church's chicken franchises in oakland. (i'm sure that is music to all the non-veg Indos in the bay area. now they have yet another reason to create demand for a wicked little industry. apparently he bought them all together for about a million bucks.

---grrr connection f a ddd i nn gggg

:: h 11:52 AM [+] ::
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