Keep in mind that you should vote. There was a time when many people I knew said they thought their vote didn't count anyway. "I'm only one vote. What's the dif?" Well, it's a big "dif". If everyone said that, no one would vote. It is you right and your obligation. I don't care who you vote for, or who you support. But the person who goes to the White House will determine the way our future plays out. So please vote. 

But I'm getting worried. I'm busy enough as it is, but now I have to stand in line for hours, maybe? Why doesn't Virginia have early voting like other sane states? Is this like the old fashion Poll Tax that prevented poor Blacks from voting back in the day? Now the working poor are forced to take half a day from work in order to vote.

I swear, if I have to wait more than a couple of hours, I'm gonna write to my congressman. I thought Tim Kaine--VA governor--was Obama's buddy? I would have thought that he'd figure out ways to increase the number of polling places and invest in new voting machines, or keep the poll places opened longer--as it is, its 6 AM to 7 PM. I go to sleep aroun 4 or 5 AM anyway; maybe I'll just stay up and be the first one to vote.

I wake up today and find out that Wachovia has melted down. I don't want to get too graphic, but I swear, I thought I'd find bricks in my underpants. WTF is going on? I mean, I have a CD in Wachovia, not a big one, mind you. I am a man of modest means, but geez, do the freakin' fat cats exemplified by those on Wall Street and in the current administration have to take this away from me, too? By having allowed less regulation and oversight in order to scheme new ways to get even richer? Think sub-prime loans, derivatives, et al..

Thank God for Citicorp. They bought out Wachovia and absorbed billions of dollars in losses, but it kept little guys like me from jumping out windows. I mean, I live pay check to pay check, saving virtually nothing because prices continue to go up while my salary remains static. I'm trying to figure out which part of the economy is strong. I must be in the wrong place because I don't see it anywhere near me.

Who said the fundamentals of the economy are strong anyway? Who said that we are a nation of whiners? Who said that the person she supports--McCain--could never run a corporation like HP?

I swear, who doesn't think we need a change?

This semester has been hectic. My colleague has been reassigned and most of the work the we had divided between the two of us has been placed in my lap. It's the end of the 4th week, and I can't wait 'til Christmas. But then, I always say that around the 4th week.

Anyway, this weekend was Alumni Weekend at our school. I started this Friday participating in a workshop on the issues of teaching Chinese characters. It was interesting enough as the faculty members from Chinese, Japanese and Korean all had different approaches and methods of teaching. The basic philosophies are so different. In Chinese, there are a kazillion characters to learn, but they are usually read in one way, whereas in Japanese, each character maintains its original Chinese pronunciation--although it has been altered significantly by the Japanese--as well as a Japanese pronunciation that they applied to it semantically. To make matters worse, depending on when the character and concept arrived in Japan, there can be two different Chinese pronunciations and two different Japanese ones.

女： female. Chinese: nyu. Japanese: (Chin) nyou, jo; (Japn) onna, me.

Anyway, the workshop was nice enough. From 3 PM, I signed up to stayin our department to welcome any alumni who decided to drop by for Alumni Weekend. But as we were setting up our conference room, we noticed a large suitcase tucked under the desk we keep in the hallway. A colleague and I asked the others if they knew anything about it. No one knew. The suitcase was rather dirty, pushed beck beneatht the desk in an obvious attempt to conceal it, and had a sticker on its side that read: "Screened: Dubai International Airport." We decided that maybe security should take a look at it.

When the campus police came, they immediately determined that it was suspicious, they blocked access to the area--which actually blocked us into our corner of the building--and contacted their supervisors who then came to confirm the threat. The building was evacuated and we descended down the back emergency stairwell. Soon, the campus police presence was everywhere, sirens whirred as police vehicles cordoned off the streets around the building, and explosive's sniffing German Sherpherds went in and out the building.

After two hours it was safe to return. As we waited, my colleagues and I talked with a member of the Homeland Security response team--yes, they took this very seriously--and he said they identified the owner of the suitcase, apparently a student who carelessly left it there for reasons we'll read about soon in the school newspaper--I don't expect it was even a blip on the media radar on a day when the Obama and McCain debate dominated their attention.

I was hoping to get some grading done while waiting for anyh possible alumni to show up, but the events of the afternoon squashed that plan. But there was no bomb and everyone was safe. I guess that was as good a way to start the weekend as any.

Wow, I can't believe I got over 400 views on my last post. I guess there are a lot of people concerned about the issue.

For that past few weeks, I've been catching up on stuff I have to do to prepare for the new academic year. Now, school has started and I find myself swamped as usual. Actually, more so. The program director was reassigned to duty at our language lab as acting director, leaving me with the duty of running our program. And, man, is there a lot on my plate now. I think I might need to change jobs.

Anyway, I hope to find the time to write as Xanga is very cathartic for all of us, right?

The furor caused by the Spanish basketball team is not nearly big enough, as far as I'm concerned. That a National team can pose for an advertisement and joke about their appearance in the Beijing Olympic by making slanty eyes is incredulous.

I first heard that they said it was a joke. One of their players said it was a playful "wink" at their hosts. Indeed, he thought it was "appropriate" and an "affectionate gesture." I have read that Li Ning, the Chinese sports wear company--the Nike of China--sponsors the Spanish national team, so the odds of the team intentionally insulting the Chinese is low. Whatever. If nothing else they were simply stupid. Maybe not racist, but definitely stupid. Their insensitivity may be blamed on ignorance--and did I mention stupidity?--but that excuse is not longer valid for their tennis team which decided to take a similar photo "in support" of their basketball team.

Are all Spanish people of the same opinion? That it is alright to mock a physical characteristic of another race? Do they not know the effect of their actions? I have had this done to me a number of times when I was a kid, mostly by those of Mexican descent amongst whom I grew up in East LA, when they called me "ching chong chinaman", or "jap". I'm pretty sure these actions and words were not expressed with affection and it did not feel appropriate to me. That the Spanish Olympic team is incapapble of comprehending their actions is mind boggling. And what are we to make ot the general silence by the Spanish people? Is this a reflection of their social values?

Personally, I am insulted.

The Olympics in Beijing started on a very sad note. The father of a former US Olympian was killed at a tourist spot in Beijing on the first day of competition by some homeless guy. I heard someone say on TV that, according to interviews with foreign residents who have lived in China for a few years, the Chinese government had ramped up the nationalism rhetoric leading up to the Olympics, framing it in an "us versus them" context, which could conceivably affect certain individuals to react in certain ways. Of course, anecdotes are unreliable unless backed by hard evidence. A simple Chinese video or news clip would suffice, but there are none forthcoming.

So the news states that it was an act of random violence and there is no reason to disbelieve such reports. Even though the host Chinese government is said to have made extra efforts to provide a safe environment for the Games, no government can patrol every corner of every street in a city the size of Beijing. But much that has been reported prior to the Olympics has focused on the government's crack down on inconvenient political groups, policing the likes of Darfur supporters or the followers of that most dangerous of threats, the Dalai Lama.

It was indeed a sad way for the Olympics to start.

The summer is for reruns, and so I will continue to re-post periodically old posts that I think might be of interest. While the 53rd anniversary date has passed for the bombing of Hiroshima--August 6--the anniversary for Nagasaki is tomorrow. Besides, given the world we live in today, I think that this post--from August 6, 2003--can still provide some necessary insight. It is a personal account of my observations of my mother, an atom bomb victim who passed six years ago due to non-Hogkin's lymphoma, a form of cancer that has been linked to--among other possible causes--those who have been exposed to mass doses of radiation.

Pause and reflect

A-Bomb, Hiroshima, and Mom Today is the 48th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima. Every August, this becomes an intense issue for many anti-nuclear groups and opponents. For me, it is just as intense, but for more personal reasons.

My mother is an A-bomb victim--hibakusha in Japanese. That makes me a second generation victim, and the research on how radiation effects second generations is still inconclusive--although a friend has told me that if I'm any indication, the research should lead to illnesses like Peter Pan syndrome. But this is not about me....

My mother--photographed in the early '50s next to Honkawa, a river in Hiroshima (I think the Atomic Dome is visible in the background)--rarely talked about her experience. I had asked her a couple of times, but she would only tell me it was terrible and offered virtually no detail. On my first trip to Japan, I visited my relatives in Hiroshima with her and learned that most victims indeed did not talk about the event... until they were talking to someone who went through the same experience. In my great-aunt's house just northwest of ground zero--the Atomic Dome--she talked very animately with her cousin's husband about their experience. I was mesmerized, and now kick myself in the butt for being so selfish, for not recording their conversation on tape or on paper to share with others. All I can offer you today is my memory--as suspect as it is.

I had interviewed my mother a few times and actually put some of it on audio tape before she passed on last year, but I have yet to transcribe them as it is still too painful even to listen to them. So I will not write about her fateful day--I will do that on some future date relying on her memories. Instead I will jot down some of the insights I have gained through her over the years...

Burns: They were shiny oval areas on her legs. They differed in size, from 4 inches to 6 inches in length. Each had what looked like veins in a leaf: a center vertical vein with several branches sprawling outward from there. I always stared at them and at times tried to run my fingers over them, but every time I tried, she would slap my hand away. These are the remnants of her burns she suffered from the atomic blast. Her burns were severe and promoted keloids--an excessive production of scar tissue. She later explained to me that these keloids would form, then become dead skin that turned black and then peeled away. After a time, as her wounds healed, they stopped forming, but they left these shiny reminders of August 6. Whenever she slapped my hand away, she would just say, "Stop it." But I wonder if it was because it hurt or because she didn't need anyone else to bring attention to her experience. These weren't her only reminders.

Physical Scars: She had an ear--the left one--that looked like a boxer's cauliflower ear. Whenever my siblings and I were horsing around and we accidentally brushed against this ear, she would freeze in pain. Causing the pain were minute shards of glass. They had been embedded inside this cauliflower ear when the windows of her office imploded from the blast. After the blast, she went to a hospital to have them removed, but she was sent away, told that she should count herself among the lucky; patients that demanded "real" care needed their attention first and foremost. My mother just let the wound heal-over as is. Amazingly, she still maintained some--albeit diminished--hearing in this ear.

Psychological scars: Whenever we went outside, particularly when she was driving, my mother wore excessively dark sunglasses. I thought she was just trying to be California cool, but I found out later that there was a reason related to Hiroshima. When she was speaking with her cousin's husband, he mentioned that even today he flinches when he sees a sudden flash of light--a reminder of the flash on August 6. My mother nodded in agreement. She went on to describe to him how sunny southern California is and that when she was driving, a glint of sunlight reflecting off a car's chrome bumper always made her catch her breath...

I was reluctant to reveal these things about my mother--she consistently avoided talk about her scars and she always tried to hide them. But towards the end of her life, she suggested that perhaps her experience might prove to be noteworthy to some. I hope that some might serve as a reminder of the horrors of war and the effects of a nuclear blast--as we all know, there are some who unfortunately still need it...

As I grow older, I can no longer do what I used to do. DUH!

There was a time when I would fast for a day and drop a few pounds. I would run a bit and work out a bit and lose another pound. But no more. Not after the big Five-Oh. I swear it is all downhill after that. You young whipper-snappers should make sure you stay fit now. Or if you're not, get fit while you can. I remember it getting hard after forty--and believe me, it takes extra work--but after fifty, fuhgedaboudit. It ain't happening.

For one thing, I can't run without having my ankles get sore, or my knees aching for a few days. Of course, being the stubborn mule that M accuses me of being--and she is always right--I've been running this summer anyway, with zero, zip, nada results. When M was in Japan in June, I was running about... um... 15 miles total a week--three or four miles over about four days. But I didn't lose a bit. In fact, I gained a few pounds. When M came back she told me I looked rounder, and I protested even though I knew I had gained some weight. but heck, I've been running, aches and all, and I was convincing myself that the weight was the muscles I had put on my legs.

Well, after checking what I had been eating while she was gone--what kind of sleuthing she did, I will never know--she told me what's what. I'd have to run the Indy 500 to lose weight after eating Cheetos and Fritos and seseme crackers--gawd I love these things--and other assorted foods. Six slices of a fully stacked large pizza will do nothing for my waistline either. But I was hungry from all the running, I protested. And pizza isn't as bad as that mercury laden tuna, right? She told me very frankly that one slice of pizza has the equivalent number of calories as a small meal, so I virtually ate a small family's worth of pizza.

With arms folded, fingers drumming on her bicep, she told me that's what I get for eating out all the time. But I cooked pretty often. Like what? Like, um, macaroni casserole with Italian sausage, cheese, and crumbled Fritos on top for some crunch. It was pretty good. Should I make it tonight? You can imagine her answer.

Her main point was that I was taking in too many simple carbohydrates--pizza crust, macaroni, corn chips--thereby allowing my body to change it into sugars that are then stored as fat. FAT!

So now, I am on a more manageable diet. Although I am personally dying. Atkins Diet is a war against carbs, but according to M, it isn't balance. So I'm eating a kind of Onigiriman modified Atkins. No simple carbs so I can't eat pizza or regular rice. Of course, I cannot have any sugar carbs, such as candy, choclate and Chewy Spree. But I allow myself to eat half a bowl of brown rice a day or a slice of whole wheat bread or cereal. Also, I will eat some fruits which is usually a BIG NO-NO for Atkins, but I need to satisfy myself someway otherwise fall into the trap of binging later and rebounding. Besides, I only eat fruit once or twice week.

As for exercise, I've been walking and walking and walking. Since there is less impact stress in walking, I have fewer aches, and am encouraged to walk more. I walk approximately 3.5 to 4 MPH at least an hour a day, and when possible three hours--and hour in the morning, afternoon and night, which would equal 10 to 12 miles. Walking before bed does wonders. You fell really skinny when you wake up. Not that I'm skinny of course. But when M came home from Japan, I had ballooned to 169 pounds, but am now down to 161 in about 5 weeks.

I hope I can keep it up even after school begins. Maybe if I lose enough, M will let me eat stuffing on Thanksgiving.

I spent Sunday at Leesburg Outlet and finished most of my Christmas shopping, spending perhaps more than I should have. Thinking I will save a few dollars during the Sales Tax Holiday, I go overboard. I can be so stupid at times. Oh well. Too late now...

I mean the spending, of course, not the stupidity...

Well, mostly the spending...

Anyway, August has arrived and that means the Fall semester is a month away. Time to get some work done before school starts. There were not very many readers who showed an interest in Senryu, so I've decided to do it another time, perhaps in a different format--I mean, how can you have a salon/contest and choose winners with only ten poets. If there were six who placed, what would that mean for the other four? Nah, that would be too mean. Sorry to those who were looking forward to composing a Senryu. Of course, you could post a random one just for the heck of it, like say, on the topic of "the ice cream man"?

Ice cream jingle nears.
Hope mom gives me some money
After I've yelled "Stop!"

Whatever happened to the ice cream man? Does he still drive through your neighborhood?