Fortune "History" Cookie?

The 12 Most Amazing Places I Have Been

The end of the year just seems to demand the making of lists!  I present my 12 most amazing places that I have ever been in alphabetical order:

 Alps in Winter (by train), Switzerland

 Arches National Park, Utah, United States

 Fundy Bay, New Brunswick, Canada

 Greater Corn Island, Nicaragua

 Jessamine Creek Gorge, Kentucky, Unites States (Yes, that's me on the rock!)

 Manuel Antonio National Park, Costa Rica

 St. Peter's Basilica, Vatican City

 Sugar Loaf Mountain, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

 Table Mountain, Cape Town, South Africa

 Toroko Gorge, Taiwan, Republic of China

 Tortugero National Park, Costa Rica

Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe

Today's Sermon #32

A new friend reminded me of this temple in T'aichung, T'aiwan that I visited back in the summer of 1981. I included this explanation in my description of it to him: "Just scoped this off of the internet. They've painted the old boy gold! He was grey weathered concrete back when I first encountered him, and he had a swallow's nest under his nose with bird guano running down his lip. It gave him the look of a crazy uncle who needed a kleenex!"

BUDDHA IN GLORY

Center of all centers, core of cores
almond self-enclosed and growing sweet
all this universe, to the furthest stars
and beyond them, is your flesh, your fruit.

Now you feel how nothing clings to you;
your vast shell reaches into endless space,
and there the rich, thick fluids rise and flow.
Illuminated in your infinite peace,

a billion stars go spinning through the night,
blazing high above your head.
But in you is the presence that
will be, when all the stars are dead.

~ Rainer Maria Rilke, 1875 - 1926
translated from the German by Stephen Mitchell

Racism 101

I work for the Montgomery County Maryland Public Schools. And I have to say, it's one of the most rigorous, diverse, and cutting edge school systems in the United States. Witness the very fact of my job. I am the Staff Development Teacher in my building. A position that all schools have. A non-classroom based position given to a master educator in which we become the mentor/catalyst/bringer of innovation and initiative disseminator in the building.

On Thursday I attended a half-day training part of which was dedicated to creating racial awareness. Something we are charged to do at our buildings sites in order to foster a deeper awareness of the pervasive ways race effects student achievement and instructional practices. The multi-year goal of MCPS is to eliminate the racial gap between student achievement. And, perhaps, to meet the requirements of No Child Left Behind the data scrutiny of student performance includes differences in gender, socio-economic status, English language proficiency, and Differently-abled/Mentally-challenged students. But most of our work vis a vis our trainings concern race. At one point, the 120 participants were encouraged to share from our personal stories; our counter story, i.e. a story which could be seen from other perspectives, but which we saw with a meaning that came from our cultural perspective uniquely. Most of the participants were white, a few were black, a few hispanic, a couple bi-racial, there were 4 men in the house.

After a couple people shared, I offered the story of a trip that I took with one of my students back in 1980 when I was teaching at an English Academy in Taiwan (I was 19 at the time....for the record!) We drove to a very rural area where the children in the village ended up surrounding us as we sat perched upon his Vespa. They were pointing and calling out something. When I asked Ho what they were saying, he replied, "They are children. They are calling you "Big Nose". They don't mean anything by it...all Americans have big noses."

Racism isn't an American invention. It isn't even a European (read white) invention. It is one of the ways that the world's people have come to see themselves against the backdrop of others. It can be as silly and innocent as those beautiful children's raucous chant or it can be endemic and poisonous to the very core of our humanity, a bringer of enslavement, a justifier of genocide. In all of it's dimensions it must be recognized. We must see it as clearly within ourselves as we see it in others. There are no clean hands, and whether innocent or incidious we must choose to be better than those who went before us.

I am so glad that I am working for a school system that recognizes the need to shift the paradigm that pervades our social network.

Taiwan Memoir #3

thecook@theshack
Originally uploaded by Randuwa.

I was born in 1961 and grew up in a little town in extreme southeastern Michigan called Flat Rock. We had this local joke that we were originally called "Level Pebble," but we grew! Needless to say, life in this little berg was rather insular when it came to other cultures.

And so, my first experience at a Chinese Restaurant was actually in Taiwan! No shit.

Not too far from the English Academy where I taught was a particular little dive that we affectionately called "The Shack". It was run by a talented and unpretentious proprietress (note the picture), and set in an open store front -- it was more like a dank little side walk cafe into which you could also find a table. The entire operation was there for anyone to witness. Her woks were well burnished with the varnished oils and residues of countless meals. And like some masthead leading this ship of culinary conquest, her infant child resided in a locked, iron, playpen on the sidewalk in front of her establishment. So we always fawned over the child as we arrived.

It was here that I experienced my first taste of To Fu, but did not warm to it until much later! I preferred her stir-fried shrimp-based creations; and her sweat-and-sour pork. The latter of which I was told was a Chinese creation meant specifically to satisfy "western" appetites, but not something that the indigenous population ever considered eating.

Now, today, I enjoy a rather intimate relationship with a particular local Chinese Restaurant -- which is to say that I have been a customer there for a little more than a decade. In fact, after touring the Hiroshige exhibit at the Phillips Collection for the second time, this time with my ex- Mr. J., he invited me to his new apartment for lunch -- a meal "catered" by this very take out place. How far have my experiences and tastes taken me from the days of "The Shack".... Yet, you may rest assured, that everyone else has been judged by her culinary expertise.

Taiwan Memoir #2

mr.s&volleyball
Originally uploaded by Randuwa.

The summer I spent in Taiwan as an English teacher, at the tender age of 20, was really wonderful. I met many beautiful people. Their glow, their genuine natures, helped to form the foundation of my own philosophy of honesty.

But in 1981, I was anything but comfortable with "honesty": Still struggling with my sexuality -- (I'm gay, you remember that, right?) -- Still dabbling in the world of evangelical Christianity for answers.

So, well within the closet, and pretending to be straight: I participated in the English Camp of my host, the "Chung-T'ai Academy," in T'aichung, Taiwan. The camp was a chance for locals to get away from the grind of their lives and spend a long weekend practicing their English, and just enjoying themselves. To this end, we would engage in sports in the afternoons -- things like volleyball and ping-pong.

After one particularly heated volleyball game I retreated to a bench on the sidelines. Soon Mr. S. joined me. He was a young man whom I found very attractive and sweet. He sat down next to me and pressed his bare leg against mine, gazed into my eyes and declared, "We have something in common." My heart STOPPED! A confluence of hopes, desires, fears, and subterfuges ALL collided in my mind.

I remember responding with a very lame, "What?"

"We have something in common," he repeated with the delight of conspiracy in his voice, and then he grasped my thigh with his sweaty hand (proximity for Taiwanese is considerable less than for us frigid Americans!). And to my frozen expression, he said, "We both have hairy legs."

Exhaling a muted sigh of relief, I glanced at his smooth and muscular legs, and sure enough, there were at least 5 little wiry, black hairs protruding from his otherwise porcelain smooth flesh.

So, Mr. S., we do have one thing in common, and I have long wondered whether or not we might have another....

R. O. C. (Taiwan) Memoir #1

taiwanmap
Originally uploaded by Randuwa.

As I said earlier, I've been very blessed to have had the opportunity to travel and live in various places. I spent my summer in 1981 in Taiwan. It was an interesting time to be there. The United States was just removing it's ties to the Republic of China militarily, in favor of a better relationship with the People's Republic of China -- an initiative begun under Nixon and then receiving greater impetus under Reagan.

So I spent the summer teaching ESOL (English as a Second Language) at an Chung Tai Academy in T'aichung. T'aichung was the third city at the time, behind T'aipei and Koahsuing. The population was about 350,000. I taught four classes that ranged from a group of girls from the city's premier girl's high school, to adults with a fair ability with English, to beginners (adults with very little exposure to the language).

The experience was awesome, and formed the basis for my choice to become a teacher. I will share more from this time, over time.