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A Tour of San Francisco and Korea

Jessica’s mom rules the day! She decided to take me out to Golden Gate Bridge, and after days of gloom and the occasional doom, we got clear blue skies to play the backdrop to the structure’s vermillion towers. After a photo-op and a great view of the harbor, we continued on to Sausalito in the pretty hills on the other side of the Bay. An expensive seaside tourist town much like the place I grew up, but not particularly heart-grabbing, the place nonetheless provided familiar tidal smells and a salty breeze, even a little foot ferry! I managed to fall and scrape my hands on the sidewalk, though, causing Jessica and her mom to wonder if I was this clumsy all the time — really, I’ve tripped all of a quarter dozen times in my life, and apparently Jessica is there for more than one of them.

We had pizza by the docks, then hurried home so that Jessica and her mom could pack for Korea — Jessica is going for a year to teach English, and her mom is helping her get settled. Meanwhile, I spent the afternoon hunting and applying for jobs. I was so engrossed that I hardly noticed the time fly by until it was time for dinner! Jessica’s mother treated me to a Korean feast: rice speckled with beans, with sides of kimchee, steamed asparagus, sweet and spicy lotus root, edamame, and pickled jalapeno daikon. This was really amazing food, and I love how traditional Korean meals are served as rice with a series of condiments, which you can easily make in large batches and store in the refrigerator and serve in those cute Japanese dishes I’m always admiring. All the fermented foods make it as healthy as it is delicious. Jessica’s family also introduced me to purple sweet potatoes, also known as taro, which they simply roast and eat out of the peel with a dessert spoon — it’s so sweet and smooth, it’s like some sort of purple custard.

Thank you, Jessica’s mom, for all your advice, your food, your hospitality. You are the best host!

2010 02 22 Travel Comments (0)

Board Games in the Dark

Ah, the good old days of playing board games in the dark. Does anyone else have fond memories of blackouts? Bainbridge had them every year, and sometimes the power would go out for days. We would trek down to the pizza place, usually through a layer of white snow, and warm ourselves over fresh gas-oven baked slices. At home we would bring blankets and sleeping bags around the fireplace and play chess, and when it got too dark, we would fall asleep by the dying embers.

I enjoyed some alone-time while Jessica and her family went to church, and they returned with a group of Jessica’s Korean friends to play Settlers of Catan. We got two games going, and the one I was in lasted forever… until all of a sudden we were all a point away from winning and it was all over in one round. Suffice to say I didn’t win. Entering our second game, though, the power blinked off. Poof! No electricity! Apparently these things are rare occurrences in San Francisco these days (probably due to the lack of trees). As things got darker, we just brought out candles, and squinted to differentiate colors on the board. The other, faster, group moved on to Jenga in the Dark, which added points of acoustic interest to the evening.

I didn’t win again, but the power came back on in time to pack things away and send the folks off to study. Ah, school… there’s always school to return to after the blissful failure of technology, isn’t there?

2010 02 21 Travel Comments (0)

Incidental and Almost Profound Meetings

I almost wasted today. Almost! I took the BART to the San Francisco Public Library, not realizing how much money that costs. I took in the be-pidgeoned UN Plaza, the golden-domed City Hall, and then proceeded to make use of the free wi-fi and free books. The library was not spectacular, just big — nothing to compare to my little art-decked Bainbridge branch. It wasn’t long before it was time to head back to meet Jessica and her friends Shereen and Matt, and I admit to being a bit bummed.

Oh, but here’s how I met the founder of Reed’s coffee shop: I got off the BART to transfer to a train that went to San Bruno, and another man did the same. He asked me if this was the place to transfer to Millbrae, which I believed was the case, but I cautioned him not to take my word for it — being from Portland, and all. “Oh really? Do you mind my asking where you went to school?” he asked. “Reed College,” I said. He took a step back and started laughing. Apparently he, too, had done a stint at Reed! I answered his questions about how things had changed, and when he asked if there was still a coffee shop, he informed me that he had started the thing.

But this guy was far cooler than that. He’s apparently a true Reedie, following no one career path, but forging his own across the globe. “Is it Tuesday? I must be changing careers!” He’s been a freelance writer, he’s done relief work in foreign countries, he’s co-founded the Human-Computer Interaction Program at Stanford, and half a dozen other things I can’t remember. The trick, he said when I asked for advice, for turning aimless wandering into a series of successful adventures, was self-confidence. Overall a very inspiring meeting, happily brought down to earth by knowing even he was in need of a confidence-boost at the moment, and was couch-surfing at a friends’ place in the meantime. Same as me. I hope we were both able to give each other a little of what we needed.

It was a good thing I was in a good mood by the time I made it to San Bruno, because my phone was dead. I found the missing keys to my logistics puzzle in the local mall, and got ahold of Jessica. We drove to San Mateo, a really nice place with a pedestrian Main Street and a large park, and had tasty sushi with Shereen and Matt. Shereen is an art major, Matt is going into agriculture and environmental studies, and both of them are as interested in environmentalism as I am. We rather cheerfully bemoaned the ruined state of the world, and happily invented wacky solutions to planetary problems. Perhaps we’ll find a second planet to raze, or throw all our junk into the sun? That couldn’t possibly go wrong! Smiles and swings are the best ways to deal with bleak issues.

You know what I’ve never seen until now? Breakfast at Tiffany’s. I was expecting something fluffy and light, but it was surprisingly complex and sophisticated. If yesterday was filled with pretty things, today was filled with things trying to be profound. Perhaps they haven’t reached that state, but in lacking perfection they are more enjoyable and entertaining. The life of a Reedie, a doomed planet, and a Crackerjack ring engraved at Tiffany’s.

2010 02 20 Travel Comments (1)

Jessica’s Awesome Friends

Last night I came home with Jessica to stay at her family’s house in San Bruno. A classic American suburb, accessible only by car, with the real main street being a four lane highway lined with cheap Asian and Mexican restaurants. We ate brunch at Jessica’s mother’s restaurant, Bay Watch, which would almost have been a standard American diner except for the health-conscious menu and Niman Ranch meat. Classy! We met Jessica’s friend Gloria, an aspiring actress, and headed to Japan Town in the City (that is, San Francisco proper). Talking about all manner of thing took place on a background of kawaii imports and lovely ceramic dishes, and finally Kinokuniya’s supply of beautiful Japanese art and craft books.

Gloria lives a block from the ocean, in a great little apartment, but even there I felt trapped by roads and block after block of built environment. Perhaps some sun would have done the pink plaster houses good, but instead there was only drizzle. It cleared up in time to meet another of Jessica’s friends, Dahlia, for tea and cake in uber-upscale Burlingame. Dahlia is a tall, blond lawyer-in-training with just a smidgen of a Russian accent, and another charming conversationalist. Jessica really does have the best taste in friends! (Ooh, does that make me awesome, too?)

We finished off the evening with a Korean movie called Antique Cake Shop, an unexpected storyline with plenty of eye candy — the cakes of the title as well as the young Korean men who make them and the almost Monty Python-esque cinematic flourishes. Unfortunately, I went to bed having read in Reed Magazine that my alma mater is tossing the Iliad in favor of the Odyssey. I miss Achilles already!

2010 02 19 Travel Comments (0)

Oakland and the Creatures of Lake and Sea

Did I forget to mention that is was sunny and warm yesterday? Gorgeous weather! Splendid! And then it wasn’t anymore. My feet were so sore that I spent the morning reading Ben’s book on cities, then ate lunch at a wonderful falafel place called Chick-O-Pea’s. Really, how could I resist? Then it was off to Oakland for the afternoon, in the hopes of meeting Thomas’s friend after class. What I didn’t expect was to find a Landscape Architect firm the moment I stepped off the BART! I let myself in and made a nuisance of myself, asking questions about what it was like to work in the field (which is totally pun in this context). I got the impression that it was still a day job, not magical, but still a challenging combination of creative and technical skills. And pocket parks.

The day was chilly and windy, but I got over that pretty quick by walking the entire distance around Lake Merritt. There’s a little park at one end containing a children’s theme park, consisting of wacky Fairy Tale houses in all colors and geometries. A little further on was a harbor full of ducks and geese and seagulls, and their accompanying groupies (also known as humans). It was nice to see people out with their families, or out for exercise, but all in all Oakland was a city as grey as the sky.

I explored the library and the downtown, but Thomas’s friend didn’t get out of class in time to meet up. Getting cold, I headed back — proud to have figured out the BART so easily! — so that Ben and I could get ready for our night on the town. Did I say town? I meant California Academy of Sciences! Open late with live music and expensive beer, just for us “adults”. We met Jessica, her sister, and Iggy, and an absolute blast looking at all the exhibits — especially the aquariums. There were walls with various sized tanks embedded in them, each with a small sampling of exotic sea life, like colorful anemones or snoring eels or very old fish. We also made good friends with the resident albino alligator. People normally think I look young, but I was so excited and awed, I’m surprised no one tried to card me again as I scampered about looking at everything! The only regret I have is that we were too late for the planetarium or the big rainforest-in-a-bubble. Next time, Gadget.

2010 02 18 Travel Comments (1)

Up and Down the Hills of Berkeley

After sleeping in short cat-naps on the train, I arrived in Emeryville and get a ride from Ben to his apartment in Berkeley. He had work during the day, so I set off to explore UC Berkeley campus and wander about in the Berkeley hills. I was surprised by how run down everything looked outside of those upper-class hills and a few restaurant-filled streets, but Ben explained this as the rich members of the city counsel forcing the town to stagnate with bad urban development decisions. Incidentally, Ben has decided to move away from psychology and towards urban development, and he spent much energy trying to convince me that dense city living is the only environmentally-conscious choice. Is there no room for those who need to be surrounded by green instead of concrete, who do not want to be around crowds of people all the time?

I tried to find Tilden park, walking through the swank neighborhoods and steep roads of the Berkeley Hills. Definitely more my style architecturally, but way beyond my price range. I almost expected someone to kick me out of their lovely gated community, but as I finished mounting Mirin (that steepest of streets), I met a wonderful woman out on her morning walk. She offered to show me the way to Tilden, which was incidentally on the way back to her house, and along the way we shared our histories and our hopes for the future — the sort of thing you talk about when a young person and an old person meet out of happenstance. She was so delightful, it made the whole adventure worthwhile. I reach Tilden but was too tired to hike it, so I walked along the road surrounded by tall and fragrant eucalyptus and eventually got a bus back to the University.

I found a little produce store and a German bakery (Vollkornbrot, oh how I missed thee!) and set my tired feet back to Ben’s. He had a friend over for dinner, and we made stir-fried vegetables and talked about our social lives. Really, I’m surprised how often I forgot to blush in that conversation! Eventually our little party came to an end, and Ben played Mass Effect while I read his astronomy book before heading to bed at the end of a very long day.

2010 02 17 Travel Comments (0)

Not Valentine’s Day

My life of late has consisted in lounging about at my parents’ home in Gig Harbor, Washington, spending the holidays with family, watching Star Trek, and occasionally seeing Anna to exchange stories of fiction and non-fiction. But now, I embark on my grand adventure: The Search for the Half-Acre Wood!

This adventure is essentially a trip to California to size it up for future habitation by myself, Thomas, and as many friends and family members as I can drag with me. I want something warmer, sunnier, not-quite-a-city, but still liberal and artsy, with a little bit of land for me to build my house upon. Everyone has something against California, so perhaps it’s no wonder it took me so long to think about the Bay Area. But even if I do not find my Holy Grail, I get to couch-surf and visit friends and have fun.

In the liminal state between isolated Gig Harbor and my hopefully-bright future down south is Portland. Portland, doomed always to be liminal in my mind. But oh! I’ve been having such a wonderful time in Portland! Thomas and I got dolled up and had a delicious dinner at Portobello, a vegan Italian joint on Friday, followed up by tea and toddies at Imbibe. Sound like Valentine’s Day got misplaced, to you? You would be correct: we celebrated Not Valentine’s Day instead! Anna loaned me the cutest cherry-covered dress, which reminded me so much of Pac-Man fruit that I had to make a pin for Thomas to accompany the theme.

On Saturday Cindy came over to keep me apprised of cuteness and her attempts to get a job at a particle collider, and Jay helped us devour a pair of good DS9 episodes. The night being young, Thomas and I then went to our friends’ Pimps & Harlots Ball, for which my costume was a 50′s housewife with another of Anna’s dresses and some Good Will pearls. There was dancing — Kellyn taught me a bit of swing! — and there were party games — at which, surprisingly, I excelled! Sunday, the Oft-Hated Day proper, Thomas and I walked around the local park and graveyard (paparazzi-ing ducks and squirrels along the way), made a delicious pasta dinner and chocolate truffles, and watched Casa Blanca in all its historical and romantic glory. Tonight we made portobello and red pepper quesadillas — I’m the proud parent of the tortillas — to accompany Jeremy Brett as Sherlock Holmes and the company of Tom and Amy.

I’ve been so happy, in fact, I’m almost convinced I should stay or return soon, but at the beginning of the week I was homesick for my folks. Why do I foolishly leave those I love behind me, even if only temporarily? In the end I will convince everyone instead to follow me to the land of sun!

2010 02 15 Life Comments (2)

The Chicken in the Box

It is likely that we evolved a moral sense to keep our communities functioning, to allow us to bond and share and coordinate. But the factors driving morality’s evolution don’t determine how we can and should think about it as modern individuals and societies, if no other reason than our still-limited understanding of psychological evolution. For example, just because we evolved to mate for the success of our offspring doesn’t mean we can’t love whom we fall for, or grow old without children of our own. That we can feel empathy for members of other species may be an accident, but the feelings are real nonetheless.

Anyone who takes the time to observe an animal commits the sin of anthropomorphism — finding enough about the animal intelligible enough to ascribe emotions and motivations to it, emotions and motivations that can only be experienced first-hand by ourselves. We should really call this sin “automorphism,” because we make this same leap of faith when interacting with other humans — we assume, based on the evidence, that others have feelings and lines of reasoning analogous to our own. (Analogous but not identical, which is why we have such trouble communicating with each other.)

Claiming species privilege, if not species superiority, denies the continuity of evolution and the blurriness of groups. Humans are not the end of the line in evolutionary history, and while we have amazing abilities, we have no right to use our abilities and points of view as the standard measure against which all other species fall short. Besides which, there are many humans who are not smart or even conscious most of the time, who function without opposable thumbs, who live with no more technology than a chimp or a crow or a fish. My facetious friends, declaring their intellectual machismo, claim they would eat starving children from Africa if it was socially acceptable. But I think they play the devil’s advocate so often they become the part, and deny the validity of their basic sympathy for beings similar to themselves. No one really wants to say that the young, the senile, and the handicapped should be treated as morally irrelevant. Even non-humans care for their sick and injured!

The other problem is where one would draw the line for “appropriate” empathy. It’s true that we fail to empathize with those we don’t interact with, but this is true no matter who the out-group is. Historically and presently, it has included people with different appearances, different languages, different practices, different genitalia. These are members of the same species, but with genetic material or cultural ideas considered inferior and worthy of less consideration than those of the in-group.

As one friend of mine suggested, we could solve this problem by putting our chickens in boxes where we cannot see them — where we cannot empathize with them. But why would we want to blind our moral sense, desensitize ourselves to cruelty? By the same logic we should sear off our nerves so that we wouldn’t have to feel pain. The truth is, we still have to put the chicken in the box. We couldn’t see the chicken everyday and not care. We have to tell myths about those we eat, convince ourselves it’s normal or even important, and ultimately forget about the animals themselves as we lick them off our lips.

2010 01 28 Philosophy Comments (0)

Eating Animals Response

I just finished Eating Animals, which is not only an excellent introduction to the issues surrounding meat-eating, from factory farms to family dinners, but also thought-provoking for an already-educated eater like myself. I think it will definitely accomplish the author’s goal of starting conversations — conversations already in progress, I’m sure, since the ethics and impact of veganism has been mentioned recently on Oprah, Martha Stewart, Ellen, The View, and other mainstream media sources. Here are some of the provoked thoughts I had as I was devouring the text…

Factory farming is just plain wrong. Only by ignoring the fact that animals can feel pain and experience suffering can you support it was a clear mind and a clear heart. But family farms are trickier, because everyone has the image of happy cows grazing on green grass. They get the chance to live good, full lives, and are protected from the stress of the wilderness. Often people justify eating meat with this image falsely fixed in their imagination, but even if that image were real, I doubt its moral integrity. Bill Niman, a small-farm rancher, is quoted in Eating Animals:

“I vividly remember lying awake the night after we’d slaughtered our first pig. I agonized over whether I’d done the right thing. But in the weeks that followed, as we, our friends, and family ate the pork from that pig, I realized that the pig had died for an important purpose — to provide us with delicious, wholesome, and highly nutritious food. I decided that as long as I always endeavored to provide our animals good, natural lives, and deaths that were free from fear or pain, raising animals for food was morally acceptable to me.”

“The pig died for an important purpose.” There might be purposes important enough to die for, but food is not it. Bringing people together over the dinner table, through traditions passed on through generations, is commendable. But it is not the highest good. Traditions can and do change. I might choose to die myself if it would end a war or a family feud, if it would save lives or vastly improves the lives of many. Yet even here, does anyone have the right to make that decision for me? Things would have to be really bad to justify murder. Perhaps it is because I couldn’t kill Hitler or the Joker even if I knew, positively, that the world would be so much better for it. Perhaps that is why I choose not to kill (or pay someone else to kill) an animal for the joy and convenience of sharing its flesh and fluids with my loved ones.

And there is something especially disturbing about killing one sentient being with whom you have bonded in order to eat it with some other companions. Mr Niman, may I slaughter some of your friends and family — who, after all, have had a good and happy life — in order to feed my own?

Not so morally acceptable now.

At the end of this chapter, Foer says that the board of directors of Niman Ranch ousted Mr Niman because they wanted to pursue less ethical, more economical practices that he opposed. Niman himself won’t eat Niman Ranch meat anymore. Up to this point, Niman and his wife and their friends had almost almost convinced me that it was actually worthwhile to pursue better conditions for farmed animals than to the complete abolition of animal agriculture — welfare over rights. Until this unexpected and unfortunate fall from grace. Niman Ranch not yet a factory farm, to be sure, but its actions demonstrate that as long as animals are treated as property and producers of valuable commodities, their interests cannot be protected. Not even by the few ranchers who really do care.

2010 01 27 Philosophy Comments (0)

Upright and Naked

I spent the Gordanier Christmas sitting cross-legged on a footstool, which had Jackie and a few other of Thomas’s relatives gaping and wondering “How can you do that?” My response was to mumble something about it being more comfortable. No, really! I’ve always loved my grandmother’s extra-firm cushions, and I’ve never slept so well as I did on Japanese floor-based futons. But it turns out that conventional notions of what makes a seat comfortable are actually quite bad for us — and, in the long run, uncomfortable.

I got this idea from Galen Cranz’s book, The Chair: “The assumption is that sitting at the edge of a seat upright, without support, is too tiring to sustain. But in other cultures, people sit upright by the hour. I wondered why we couldn’t do that. A radical thought kept surfacing: we can’t sit upright simply because we have grown accustomed to being supported by chairbacks. Because we lean against the backrest, the many layers of muscle that comprise the torso get weakened” (p. 95). This has far-reaching effects on our health: chair-sitting is a leading cause of back pain, as it puts pressure on the spinal disks and in turn stresses out the nerves and muscles of the lower back — even moreso than physical labor. The “C-shaped slump” that chairs force us into creates a hump in our spine as we lean backwards but stick out our necks, and it also compresses the diaphragm, squishes the organs, and reduces blood circulation, leading to acid reflux and varicose veins. Chairs seem so innocent that it’s almost amusing when we find out that “the head of a Norwegian furniture company has confessed that he felt guilty about making his living from producing chairs after he learned about the health problems they create” (p. 100). (You can read an interview with the author here.)

This all sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Walking and running barefoot is better for our posture, too. Less padding in both cases allows our bones, whether in our feet or the sit bones of our butt, to find a stable connection with a firm surface that supports us. Better than chair sitting is to perch on stools (especially tall ones), kneel, squat, recline, sit cross-legged, or stand. In fact, it’s even better to change your position every so often — walking or lying down (on your back with your knees up) is the best way to relieve back pain. Funny that these are also the sorts of recommendations for staying minimally fit, using your muscles throughout the day like we evolved to do?

So are we doomed to revert to the naked apes we are under all our culture and technology? Does nothing truly improve our lot in life, or are the improvements — like true medicines hidden in witchcraft — so tangled up that we can do nothing but futility oscillate between unhappy extremes? Chairs have been used since the Neolithic, but this does nothing to ensure they’re more “natural” for us to use. We may have to face the fact that our bodies are optimized for imperfection and change, and that there is no single optimum strategy for how to live. Which is a horrible thing for a perfectionist like me to realize.

Nonetheless, it looks like the jury is in on chairs, at least: they’re bad. So my New Year’s resolution is a strange one: don’t use them! I won’t lean back into their siren-song of comfort wherever I have the option of strengthening my autonomous sitting skills. Go forth and squat!

2010 01 02 Philosophy Comments (0)