T H E W I L D W I L D E A S T D A I L I E S

Heaven in New York? Chinatown:)

noreply@blogger.com (WildWildEast) — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 01:26:00 -0500

My last year+ in New York has been eventful, to say the least. Some might say challenging. Others have said it was a bitch. Being arrested and seeing my friends arrested for exercising our first amendment rights with Occupy Wall Street - not being able to smoke almost anywhere - the rigors of looking for a new position in a crippled job market. The general politics and pessimistic outlook of the country at large. Hurricanes. The American hallmark of mass public shootings. The general malaise and hubris I saw coming on when I first shipped out for Korea in 1995, made me long for Asia:)

So recently, when a friend told me about a Chinese video game room (비디오 방 in Korean) where I could use a nice computer for 15 hours for $10 total, buy cigarettes for $6.50 a pack vs.the standard $14, bring in my own beer, and nap during the session if needed, I felt like I was going home - to a place like many in Asia and even a few in Europe I frequented. The only catch is that you must use the computer time in one stretch.

And so I was off to Chinatown away from the watchful eye of a government that shows more concern over what size soda I drink than whether I own an automatic weapon or not, to exercise all the rights I used to have in this country - once upon a time.

The main lure of course, is the cheap computer time, having had my laptop crash last winter and not having replaced it. The other things, are just a convenience, and a comfort if you will, for someone who has spent the last 16 years out of country in lands of the more free.

Using my 15 hrs, in two stretches, I was able to do a massive amount of uploading and processing on the over 1300 paintings rendered at iTOMB, clear a years worth of email, write a proposal for a Pringles/Star Wars promo , smoke all the while, and only have to hear Gangnam Style a few hundred times. All the computers have speakers and gamers tend to favour them over headphones. I use headphones. And that's where the film clip above comes in.

As I edit, organize and retouch art, it's always nice to have a soundtrack in the background. For over 30 years, My Dinner With Andre, a film By Louis Malle with Wallace Shawn and Andre Gregory as both writers and actors, has been one of my favourites - not for it's visuals, but for the narative that begs one to imagine broader, more free and open thoughts - much of what I try to impart at iTOMB.

And the last two minutes of the film might quite be my favourite ever, with the spare piano of Erik Satie. He treats himself to a cab, riding home through a city of complexity, considering his simple life, and how it really is not so simple at all, but resigned and calmed - much the way I feel now. Much the way I feel in this oriental island on the larger island of Manhattan. Much the way I wonder, just how all of this will play out. Like Wallace, looking out the window as he rides.

About "About Me"

noreply@blogger.com (WildWildEast) — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 15:58:00 -0400

I am currently involved in international marketing projects in New York City. Please let the following serve as an introduction to my work and career. Or check my profile on LinkedIn.

DEC.BIO.AD.03.14.12

"If You Can Make It There, You'll Make It Anywhere" - It's Feels Good to be Home

noreply@blogger.com (WildWildEast) — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 21:45:00 -0400

Michael Moore

There's something in the bones about New York. For me, something in a hint of a memory of 335 E. 86th Street, where I was hatched. Something borne in one. I think of it mostly as I walk and ride the city every day. I think mostly about those for whom this city would definitely not work. My family. The girl I went to Europe and Africa with. Nearly everyone I knew in Vietnam, and most in Korea as well. The rest of the world. It's not for everyone, yet everyone is here. People from 100 countries, and more. It's the only city in the US I knew would be international enough for me to feel at home. In a recent post, Seth Godin reasons because "It's Different Here" and he recounts:

It’s different here (as in not the same)

You can find someone to have an argument with, about just about anything

There are fringes--cultural, educational, architectural, societal

More than 42 languages are spoken at the Queens public library

You can get something that’s not the regular kind

There are profit-seekers who will happily sell you something, anything

There are many who do things for no profit at all and will eagerly entertain, entrance and change you for the better

You will find a diversity of religious belief like no other

It’s changing

The food hasn't been entirely homogenized

People are active

A stranger will go out of his way for you, perhaps, and more often than you expect

There is more information per minute, per meter and per interaction

Neighborhoods are more important than homogeneity, and co-existing is most important

But there's more. Compared to Asia (and even to Paris) the subway is a dirty smelly hellhole that would be an embarrassment to any developed country - but New Yorkers like it that way (most of them haven't seen Asia or Europe).. It wouldn't be NYC without it. Conversations pass daily on how organized crime controls government and government controls the people - but that's how it is. Sadly. One guy tried to impress me recently with the idea of how much better the US is than Somalia right now. Interesting. We now have to compare ourselves to underdeveloped third-world nations in political turmoil to be better than someone. But that's how it is.

Yesterday Michael Moore showed up at the Occupy Wall Street protest in Zuccotti Park. This morning it was Susan Sarandon. Tonight I listened to Professor Cornel West from Princeton University. Inspiring. Yes, it's different (and fucked-up) here, and I love that. The Wild Wild East has now inhabited Asia, Europe, Africa, the Wild Wild Upper East Side of NYC and even Wild Wild East Broadway and things are just fine. Recently a girl commented on my "A Suspension of Disbeliefs" blog that my writing has become more "America-centric" since returning, and she surmises, that, "that makes' sense. Before I wrote about America from afar. Now I write to afar from America. It's a small world in any case and I am now your correspondent in NYC.