Happy New Year

L'shanah tovah tikatev v'taihatem. L'shanah tovah tikatevi v'taihatemi.

Rosh Hashanah and the Yamim Noraim begin at sunset today.

Baruch hu uvaruch shemo.

Requiescat in Pace

Another great actor gone.

Martin Ritt’s The Long, Hot Summer, Paris Blues, Hud, The Outrage, Hombre
Stuart Rosenberg’s Cool Hand Luke, Pocket Money, The Drowning Pool
Richard Brooks’ Cat On a Hot Tin Roof, Sweet Bird of Youth
Robert Altman’s Buffalo Bill and the Indians, Quintet
John Huston’s The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean, The Mackintosh Man
George Roy Hill’s Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Sting
Alfred Hitchcock’s Torn Curtain
James Ivory’s Mr and Mrs Bridge
Sidney Pollack’s Absence of Malice
Sam Mendes’ Road to Perdition
Daniel Petrie’s Fort Apache, the Bronx
Robert Rossen’s The Hustler
Otto Preminger’s Exodus
Robert Wise’s Somebody Up There Likes Me
Sidney Lumet’s The Verdict
Joel and Ethan Coen’s The Hudsucker Proxy
Robert Benton’s Nobody’s Fool, Twilight
Martin Scorcese’s The Color of Money
Leo McCarey’s Rally Round the Flag, Boys
Roland Joffe’s Fat Man and Little Boy
Luis Mendoki’s Message in a Bottle
and Newman’s own Sometimes a Great Notion, Harry and Son.

What else is there to say?

Paul McCartney in Israel

Paul and I arrived in Israel close to each other. More so by time than space. He came on a private jet. I came packed into a 747 with 200 other people. You can fly from London to Tel Aviv directly in about five hours. Shanghai to Tel Aviv is about 18 hours with a connection in Bangkok. He checked into several floors of an overpriced seafront hotel. I went home to my apartment facing the mountains. He made a few tourist stops. I went to sleep.

Then came the sound checks. I was walking through Ganei Yehoshua and I heard Paul tell me to get back. I was confused. This is my park. I live here. And why is he singing his warning? Stop calling me Jo Jo.

There is something surreal about walking through your local park and hearing Paul McCartney sing a few songs with his band. It is not that common to hear from a CD player but far less so to hear it from Paul himself. I would have gone closer to have a look but large men with automatic weapons suggested I not. Still it was a nice little show and I heard it for free. I did not get to see anything but neither did the people who paid for the overpriced seats at the later show itself.

Cunning Linguists

Some would say Jie Yi speaks two languages, 中文 [Chinese] and 英語 [English]. She would say she speaks four, 官話 [Mandarin], 吳語 [Wu], 徽語 [Hui] and 英語 [English]. This is where it gets interesting, to me at least. I can recognise how this might be very boring to some. If 中文 is a language then 官話 and 吳語 are dialects. If 中文 is really a linguistic group then 官話 and 吳語 are languages. No matter how you want to classify these things 徽語 is really a dialect of 吳語. It’s like calling 美語 and 英語 different languages. They are but they’re really not.

I’m undecided. If they’re all really dialects then why do each of them have their own dialects? And why do they sound so different? Somebody speaking 官話 might not recognise somebody speaking 吳語. But if they’re really different languages then why do they all have the same written language for the most part? If you can read 中文 then you can read 官話, 吳語, 徽語.

Civil Obedience

From my point of view I have 2 homelands. Israel, land of my ancestors, a few thousand years ago. And South Afrika, land of my birth, more recently. Both are losing their leaders.

Things can only get better in Israel. South Africa is in for tough times ahead.

China Journal ‘08: 江蘇

江蘇

長江

网师园

Land of many lakes

南京

中秋節



夫子廟

水乡



Part of the 1000km coastline



摄于南京中山陵



Jie Yi’s family cemetery

Richard Wright RIP

He died Monday of cancer. It’s really a greater loss than most people will realise. The pretentious people will always argue about Gilmour vs Barrett or Waters vs Gilmour. No matter which period you prefer Wright was there. His keyboard defined the Pink Floyd sound from Barrett’s psychedelic pop songs to Gilmour’s crying guitar to Waters’ angst and superstardom and back to Gilmour again. He was there before Gilmour and after Waters. You could fire him from the band but you couldn’t keep him away.

Chinese Driving Tips

I made the mistake of driving in 南京. I really didn’t want to drive during this trip. I drove too much when I lived in 安徽. My views on drivers in China is nothing new. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. They’re without doubt the worst drivers in the world.

Chinese Astrology: Just Me

If I were Chinese I’d accept my fate. But I’m Jewish. We fight back. Not so much in the first 5000 years but we’ve figured it out lately. As accurate as most of this information is I don’t believe we’re all doomed to live the way some chart says we will. I think the predictions mostly come true because people believe they will. They subconsciously or consciously make it happen. I choose to reject the bad and embrace the good. I will have children and we will have a great relationship. I’ll move the stars to make that happen.

Chinese Astrology: Four Sisters

I didn’t know anything about Chinese astrology before I moved here. I think I was vaguely aware that it was the Year of the Sheep but I didn’t know what that meant or how pertinent that was to me personally. I looked into it out of curiosity and then started to study it deeper. I don’t think I am who I am because of what year I was born in or how the stars were aligned but there are some interesting parallels between astrology and relationships in my family.

Everybody Loves the Sound of a Train in the Distance

Taking the train to 雲林.

China Journal ‘08: 雲林

雲林 rice paddies

Dave’s place

天后宮



Beast of burden

More rice paddies

The most expensive real estate district
[with a scenic view of rice paddies]

The long and straight road that leads to 雲林