Displacement.
In my travels abroad, I first felt it in on the plane from Osaka to Tokyo. Because everybody was Japanese. Everybody. Not only that, the entertainment provided for our viewing pleasure was sumo. I'd never seen sumo before, in person or on TV. And here it was.
Displacement.
It's what I've felt for almost six years now, if not on a daily basis, surely on a weekly one. It's not an altogether nasty feeling; truth be told, I've grown so accustomed to it, so expectant of its insights, that to be denied its jarring nudge would be almost, well, cruel.
Displacement.
The nature of streets -- in Japan, narrow and winding; in Cambodia, dusty and bumpy. The look of people, their shapes and sizes. The smell of the breeze. The varying configuration of buildings large and small. The colour of the sun at night, as it slinks into dusk. The emotional transactions that conversations require.
Displacement.
I apologize for belaboring the point, but I don't think I can underestimate what a powerful, almost liberating force such a condition engenders. Growing up in one place, the same place, you think, as you must: This is the world. This is the way the world works. This is the way that life has chosen to reveal itself.
And then, suddenly, as suddenly as an airplane touching ground, as fast and as jarring, you begin to learn. You realize that everything you know, everything you've been taught, all the ideas about human existence that have been formed and passed down to you are, at best, inadequate. I won't say wrong, or misguided, or intentionally lacking; these terms imply a kind of intent that society does not plan. People are people, and humans are humans, and they raise their children the way that they were raised. This is not a flaw but a necessity.
But it's inadequate. Because even though we are becoming more and more connected, and more and more multi-cultural, the fruits of these alliances are illusory (at best). We can eat ethnic food and marvel over National Geographic's vivid depictions of those who are different than ourselves -- but it's not enough.
Not enough for what? What do I expect?
I cannot speak for you; I'm not sure that I can even speak for myself. Knowledge is hard to attain, and difficult to process, let alone articulate.
I find it somewhat ironic that on the same day Terri Schiavo passes away from starvation, the Pope is revealed to be being kept alive by means of a feeding tube. That is a literary image and coincidence that any self-respecting editor would dismiss as being too on-the-point, obvious and over-the-top.
I don't know what these two people, the citizen and the saint, will ulitmately come to represent, but both cases point, with a laser-like intensity, at the sanctity of life, and what we will do, and not do, to preserve it. And our opinions on this issue, on life itself, are nurtured in the towns and provinces and countries and societies that sustain us. All of which lead to conviction, and certainty, and obstinancy.
"I am right," we think. "What I believe is the truth, the path, the way that things should be."
And whether you are a shah in Iran or a dictator in Cambodia or a preacher in Milwaukee or a teacher in Moosejaw, the end result of this line of thinking is the same: inertia.
Life itself has a three-dimensionality that I had never considered before leaving Canada. I was subsequently allowed access, access to views on life that are separate and isolated from those that shaped me.
I was offered, and accepted, displacement.
And, hopefully, this same process will eventually enable me to fit myself back into the puzzle of my own culture with a rudimentary but piercing understanding, however partial, of how complex and mystifying the human condition truly is. How devoid of easy answers and lock-step conclusions, and how better off we all for that ambiguous confusion.
Friday, April 01, 2005
REALLY RANDOM STUFF: IT'S PAT, A COMEDIC INTERLUDE, AND WHY GARY COLEMAN IS A LESSON FOR US ALL
I'm trying really, really hard to keep this blog focused on international and social issues that speak to us all as humans first and nationalities second, and with that in mind I feel it's my duty to point out that Wheel of Fortune's Pat Sajak, a global treasure, has his own blog at www.patsajak.com, where he writes about baseball and his thoughts on being a Republican in Democrat-centred Hollywood and other interesting, essential issues central to our perserverance as a species, and if you're wondering how I came across this information, it's so that you wouldn't have to. Not everyone can handle that much Pat; I can. Enter at your own discretion, and don't blame me for the consequences.
*************************************************************************************
"I'm against picketing, but I don't know how to show it."
-- Mitch Hedberg
*************************************************************************************
I was just thinking: At one point, Gary Coleman was the man. He was the dude. You can't get any bigger than Diff'rent Strokes. You can't. He had his ass kissed on a daily basis. People cut his hair for free, brought him sandwiches, secretly rooted for him because their jobs depended on how funny he was.
And then one day the show was cancelled, and he becomes a joke. I know, because I've made jokes about him, and Emmanuel Lewis, too. That's not right. (And for my birthday one year a few years back my friends Eric and Greg took me to Yuk Yuk's comedy club in Niagara Falls, Ontario, where the featured comedians were Marc 'Skippy' Price from Family Ties, along with his special guest, Emmanuel 'Webster' Lewis from Webster, and it was so sad, seeing these two young men who had provided so much entertainment for me as a kid, reduced to groping for laughs from an audience who were more urgently concerned with downing some beer and, potentially, copping a few feels from their dates.)
That's what sucks about success -- it never, ever lasts. Ask Milton Berle. George Burns. Chevy Chase. Gerald Ford. The dude who played handyman Schneider on One Day at a Time. Eventually, it goes, leaves, hikes up its thumb and hits the road. That's what I think about when I watch the Oscars, or listen to music, or cruise the net. We are viewing the next generation of has-beens. It's an illusion, all of it, the whole deal. Instead of thinking of 'celebrity' as something that one goes out and actually aspires to and achieves, it's better to think of it as something that one lives through, and emerges from, scalded but alive (hopefully).
And the great thing about living abroad is that you begin to learn that being famous doesn't, mean, shit. You know why? Because noone's famous. Not really.
You think anybody in Japan or Cambodia knows who Oprah Winfrey is? Ray Romano? Yes, sure, Brad Pitt is huge in Japan, and Tom Cruise, but that's about it. They don't know who the hell Johnny Carson was, and they don't care. The only westerners that Cambodians can recognize are George W. Bush and maybe, if they have a satellite dish, Larry King.
All the things that the western media focus on, the Jerry Springers and Dr.Phils and P.Diddy's and Puff Daddy's and 50 Cents and Madonnas and Jack Nicholsons and whomever, it's all transitory; it's all see-through. They're all the Gary Colemans of the future. We just have to wait.
Reality TV has made the everyman a celebrity, which means nobody is a celebrity. Maybe it's better to focus on the people who live next door to us, or across the street, rather than the ones on a supermarket tabloid while we buy out Ben and Jerry's. (Which, incidentally, I don't think I've ever tried, given that that particular ice cream brand isn't available in Canada, I don't think, but I'm reaching for a colourful image. And yes, I spelled 'colourful' with a 'u', because that's how Canadians spell it. I need to hang on to my Canadian heritage and language usage in order to maintain my citizenship. If you don't believe me, just see bylaw 056479-03321-A section three, paragraph two, line four, right under the picture of Pamela Anderson, who, true story, at the time of her birth, was somehow chosen as Canada's Centennial Baby because she was born on July 1, 1967, which was Canada's one hundredth birthday, and nobody knew at the time that she would grow up to be a bona-fide representative of California bimbodom because she was a) a baby, and b) a Canadian, but there you go. And she recently received American citizenship, as did Jim Carrey, as did Michael J.Fox, as did Peter Jennings, and it's not that I'm against them doing it, as they still maintain their Canadian citizenship, but I can't help but feeling a lit bit, as a Canadian, deflated because of it. Which shows you how celebrity has wrecked my world, because I know all of the above facts, when I really should know more about the pythagorean theorem and the Versailles treaty. Don't know shit about either.)
The people on the floor us below might not be as interesting as Rosie O'Donnell or Kirstie Alley, no, but, assuming you stay in the same place, I'm betting you that they, unlike insert-celebrity-name-here will still be around and relevant in twenty, thirty years time.
And they'll probably have something to say.
*************************************************************************************
"I'm against picketing, but I don't know how to show it."
-- Mitch Hedberg
*************************************************************************************
I was just thinking: At one point, Gary Coleman was the man. He was the dude. You can't get any bigger than Diff'rent Strokes. You can't. He had his ass kissed on a daily basis. People cut his hair for free, brought him sandwiches, secretly rooted for him because their jobs depended on how funny he was.
And then one day the show was cancelled, and he becomes a joke. I know, because I've made jokes about him, and Emmanuel Lewis, too. That's not right. (And for my birthday one year a few years back my friends Eric and Greg took me to Yuk Yuk's comedy club in Niagara Falls, Ontario, where the featured comedians were Marc 'Skippy' Price from Family Ties, along with his special guest, Emmanuel 'Webster' Lewis from Webster, and it was so sad, seeing these two young men who had provided so much entertainment for me as a kid, reduced to groping for laughs from an audience who were more urgently concerned with downing some beer and, potentially, copping a few feels from their dates.)
That's what sucks about success -- it never, ever lasts. Ask Milton Berle. George Burns. Chevy Chase. Gerald Ford. The dude who played handyman Schneider on One Day at a Time. Eventually, it goes, leaves, hikes up its thumb and hits the road. That's what I think about when I watch the Oscars, or listen to music, or cruise the net. We are viewing the next generation of has-beens. It's an illusion, all of it, the whole deal. Instead of thinking of 'celebrity' as something that one goes out and actually aspires to and achieves, it's better to think of it as something that one lives through, and emerges from, scalded but alive (hopefully).
And the great thing about living abroad is that you begin to learn that being famous doesn't, mean, shit. You know why? Because noone's famous. Not really.
You think anybody in Japan or Cambodia knows who Oprah Winfrey is? Ray Romano? Yes, sure, Brad Pitt is huge in Japan, and Tom Cruise, but that's about it. They don't know who the hell Johnny Carson was, and they don't care. The only westerners that Cambodians can recognize are George W. Bush and maybe, if they have a satellite dish, Larry King.
All the things that the western media focus on, the Jerry Springers and Dr.Phils and P.Diddy's and Puff Daddy's and 50 Cents and Madonnas and Jack Nicholsons and whomever, it's all transitory; it's all see-through. They're all the Gary Colemans of the future. We just have to wait.
Reality TV has made the everyman a celebrity, which means nobody is a celebrity. Maybe it's better to focus on the people who live next door to us, or across the street, rather than the ones on a supermarket tabloid while we buy out Ben and Jerry's. (Which, incidentally, I don't think I've ever tried, given that that particular ice cream brand isn't available in Canada, I don't think, but I'm reaching for a colourful image. And yes, I spelled 'colourful' with a 'u', because that's how Canadians spell it. I need to hang on to my Canadian heritage and language usage in order to maintain my citizenship. If you don't believe me, just see bylaw 056479-03321-A section three, paragraph two, line four, right under the picture of Pamela Anderson, who, true story, at the time of her birth, was somehow chosen as Canada's Centennial Baby because she was born on July 1, 1967, which was Canada's one hundredth birthday, and nobody knew at the time that she would grow up to be a bona-fide representative of California bimbodom because she was a) a baby, and b) a Canadian, but there you go. And she recently received American citizenship, as did Jim Carrey, as did Michael J.Fox, as did Peter Jennings, and it's not that I'm against them doing it, as they still maintain their Canadian citizenship, but I can't help but feeling a lit bit, as a Canadian, deflated because of it. Which shows you how celebrity has wrecked my world, because I know all of the above facts, when I really should know more about the pythagorean theorem and the Versailles treaty. Don't know shit about either.)
The people on the floor us below might not be as interesting as Rosie O'Donnell or Kirstie Alley, no, but, assuming you stay in the same place, I'm betting you that they, unlike insert-celebrity-name-here will still be around and relevant in twenty, thirty years time.
And they'll probably have something to say.
WESLEY SNIPES AND THE POTENTIAL RESCUE OF ALL OUR LOST AND NEGLECTED MOMENTS IN TIME
Yesterday I was scanning the selection at my local DVD shop here in Phnom Penh when I spotted Boiling Point, an early nineties Wesley Snipe/Dennis Hopper police thriller that I saw sometime in high school, forgot had ever existed, only to have it reappear in my life here, now, in Cambodia.
Not that this is rare. There are always movies that you've forgotten you've seen, or aren't sure that you've seen, or are pretty sure that you've seen, but you could be wrong.
I guess I didn't like the movie all that much, as I can only remember a few stray images. I like Wesley Snipes more as an actor than an action star; he was great in Mo' Better Blues and Jungle Fever and The Waterdance and One Night Stand. (Shameless name dropping moment: I actually got Snipes' autograph at the Toronto Film Festival Screening of One Night Stand in the mid-nineties. Snipes was sitting a few rows back from me during the screening at the now sadly defunct Uptown Theatre, and as soon as the lights went up I high-tailed it over to his row and asked for his John Hancock. At that same moment, Roger Ebert said hello to Snipes, asked if he was still living in Chicago, congratulated him on the movie. So Ebert stole my moment with Snipes, is what I'm getting at...)
And yet, seeing that DVD cover last night, of a movie I can scarcely recall, brought about a brief, almost crystalline moment of sadness into being.
Why? Because it reminds me of how much we forget; sometimes I think we forget most of our lives, if not all of them.
I probably saw that movie in Grade 11, 12. (I seem to have vague memories of me watching it in the Pendale Cinemas; I almost always remember which theatre I saw which movie in, a weird quirk of mine.) Me and my friends used to go to the movies every Friday night, usually catching a 7 o'clock and 9 o'clock show. I would have seen the ad for Boiling Point in the newspaper, chatted with my friends, decided to catch it as either the first feature of the night, or the last. I probably went for a run after school. I might have been the one to drive that night, or maybe my friend Eric, or Greg; we usually took turns. We probably went to Mickey Dee's, or grabbed a pizza. It might have been a cold night in February, or a warm spring evening in late April. I probably had to work the next day, stacking books at the downtown library. I might have jotted a few thoughts about the movie somewhere in a journal of mine.
I don't know.
This is all speculation.
That night is lost. I know I saw the movie; I know that, for a few hours at least, my life intersected with the life of the movie. That movie dictated, to a small extent, a night in my life. Just one night, true, but still. The only thing I can recollect from that point in time is this movie, the fact that I saw it.
Everything else from that night is gone.
That's the way it has to be, I guess. We can't hold on to everything, right?
But still. Sometimes I like to think that the memories of that night, the details of that night, are hidden elsewhere, in some neighboring dimension, like stubborn, abandoned children that refuse to believe that they are orphans. Stored away by some unseen God from the indifferent, prying fingers of time and age and distance. Waiting for the perfect chance to discard their celestial camoflauge and reveal themselves in one shining, almost blinding blast of concentrated, enduring nostalgia.
Not that this is rare. There are always movies that you've forgotten you've seen, or aren't sure that you've seen, or are pretty sure that you've seen, but you could be wrong.
I guess I didn't like the movie all that much, as I can only remember a few stray images. I like Wesley Snipes more as an actor than an action star; he was great in Mo' Better Blues and Jungle Fever and The Waterdance and One Night Stand. (Shameless name dropping moment: I actually got Snipes' autograph at the Toronto Film Festival Screening of One Night Stand in the mid-nineties. Snipes was sitting a few rows back from me during the screening at the now sadly defunct Uptown Theatre, and as soon as the lights went up I high-tailed it over to his row and asked for his John Hancock. At that same moment, Roger Ebert said hello to Snipes, asked if he was still living in Chicago, congratulated him on the movie. So Ebert stole my moment with Snipes, is what I'm getting at...)
And yet, seeing that DVD cover last night, of a movie I can scarcely recall, brought about a brief, almost crystalline moment of sadness into being.
Why? Because it reminds me of how much we forget; sometimes I think we forget most of our lives, if not all of them.
I probably saw that movie in Grade 11, 12. (I seem to have vague memories of me watching it in the Pendale Cinemas; I almost always remember which theatre I saw which movie in, a weird quirk of mine.) Me and my friends used to go to the movies every Friday night, usually catching a 7 o'clock and 9 o'clock show. I would have seen the ad for Boiling Point in the newspaper, chatted with my friends, decided to catch it as either the first feature of the night, or the last. I probably went for a run after school. I might have been the one to drive that night, or maybe my friend Eric, or Greg; we usually took turns. We probably went to Mickey Dee's, or grabbed a pizza. It might have been a cold night in February, or a warm spring evening in late April. I probably had to work the next day, stacking books at the downtown library. I might have jotted a few thoughts about the movie somewhere in a journal of mine.
I don't know.
This is all speculation.
That night is lost. I know I saw the movie; I know that, for a few hours at least, my life intersected with the life of the movie. That movie dictated, to a small extent, a night in my life. Just one night, true, but still. The only thing I can recollect from that point in time is this movie, the fact that I saw it.
Everything else from that night is gone.
That's the way it has to be, I guess. We can't hold on to everything, right?
But still. Sometimes I like to think that the memories of that night, the details of that night, are hidden elsewhere, in some neighboring dimension, like stubborn, abandoned children that refuse to believe that they are orphans. Stored away by some unseen God from the indifferent, prying fingers of time and age and distance. Waiting for the perfect chance to discard their celestial camoflauge and reveal themselves in one shining, almost blinding blast of concentrated, enduring nostalgia.
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