31 December 2014

New Year's Eve 2014/2015

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We are hanging in there, and this year we escaped flooding once again (unlike the dread year of our 2011 Flood), although southern Thailand has had some bad flooding this year. We now have a very brief respite from the worst of the tropical heat. The year 2014 started with anti-government protests, mass demonstrations, and a bit of violence. But the Royal Thai Army stepped in with a coup d’etat on 22 May and declared martial law. Parliament was sent home. We had an Army squad on the corner by the police station for quite a while, but Thailand has seemed to quiet down for the time being.

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Our biggest personal loss this year was the passing of dear Mommy Kitty. She had been sick for a long time, and one day when at her lowest ebb she crept off to die in private. We miss her. (I still intend to write more about her heroic motherhood.) She slept by my feet for years, and I still roll over carefully in the night, thinking that she might be there. But a new generation showed up in the form of little Jiuu, a rescued kitten that is tearing up everything in reach. Together with Willy and Pinkie, Tuk and I are celebrating at home tonight.

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Of the many books I’ve read this year, here are some of my favorites (with links to any reviews):

On the Nature of Things by Lucretius;

Cato: a tragedy (1713) by Joseph Addison

Classic exposes of Scientology by Russell Miller and Jon Atack

The Eiger Sanction by Trevanian

The Darkship series by Sarah Hoyt

Ayn Rand: the Russian radical by Chris Matthew Sciabarra (not yet reviewed).

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The best movie I’ve seen this year:

Whiplash, without a doubt.

Honorable mention:

Edge of Tomorrow.

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-Zenwind.

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29 December 2014

Post-Christmas Post

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Christmas 2014 came and went without much community notice up here in Nonthaburi, although Christmas carols could be heard in the major malls down in the city. (And carols on my streaming internet radio stations are inescapable.) All of December has had a festive atmosphere on our street since HM the King’s birthday is on 5 December, and yellow light displays are on all the trees. (Yellow is the color associated with the King.) The lights are kept on until after New Year’s Day, and they are really something to see. Stumbling home after a pub crawl, it’s like traveling through a winter wonderland – without the snow and cold.

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The highlight of my Christmas was telephoning my sister and her gathered family in the old homestead in Pennsylvania. It was their Christmas Eve, and we talked until my voice gave out. (I’m not used to talking that much!)

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I never did get to see the Geminid meteor showers as I had hoped when writing my last post here. By the time it got dark enough, haze had made seeing any stars impossible. Now I know why there are no astronomy clubs in the greater Bangkok area.

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I’m feeling better, although I’m still weak from the forced inactivity from the thrombosis. The doctor told me to not do any treadmill work for a while even if I felt up to doing it. I see him again after the New Year. But I have been walking the neighborhood loop down by the river and around by the hospital – a neat little 4 and one-half klick distance. I see my Thai friend who makes key copies near the hospital and stop to talk with him briefly. He speaks a bit of English because he had spent some time in the USA a long time ago. Nice guy. On my walks I see a few other Thai folks I know, most of whom do not speak English but who know me by sight. The friendliness makes it truly my own neighborhood.

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Some mornings during this our Cool Season are fresh like a summer morning on the farm. But the sun is still hot. The two previous days were very humid, with rain falling one evening. Yesterday was more of the typical hot-humid hell day we would find most other times of the year. I wish I could get out to walk earlier in the morning when it’s the most comfortable, but my evening FMS meds make me too groggy to do much of anything before 11:00 AM.

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Sick Skinny Silly Willy sleeps next to me now. Why do animals near death seek me out? He likes to go out and lie in the sun at midday.

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Our new kitten, “Tiny” (or, “Jiuu,” in Thai) is a clown. She is about seven months old and rips a destructive path through her world as only a young cat can do. She terrorizes poor old Pinkie, who is shy. But Silly Willy just stares her down. Jiuu will charge straight at Willy in full fighting mode, only to veer off at the last moment. It’s as if she is reading Willy’s mind, “Come on, you little bitch; I’m too sick to chase you, but if you come close enough you’ll be sorry; come on, make my day.” Jiuu just watches him with mystification from the sidelines as Willy turns his back on her with contempt. Little amateur cat up against the (ailing) big-league feline.

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I just finished reading the lengthy Ayn Rand: the Russian radical (1995; 2013) by Chris Matthew Sciabarra. Wow! Chris has been an internet acquaintance for several years from some neo-Objectivist discussion e-lists. He is quite a gentleman and one hell of a great scholar. I would like to review this book properly someday on Zenwind, but here I will just mention that he looked at Rand through the context of the culture she grew up in, in Russia’s “Silver Age” of literature and philosophy. He focuses on her (very Russian, and also very Aristotelian) “dialectical” methods of explaining history and philosophy – and I must say that he brings up integrative trends in her thinking that I had noticed from the very first and which he analyzes in the wider context of Western philosophy. It is a unique and masterful work of scholarship – and it’s the second volume of a trilogy he has completed on philosophy. (The temptation is gnawing at me – shall I examine the other two volumes?)

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Enough.

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-Zenwind.

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14 December 2014

Vivaldi on a fine day

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Comfortable weather here is a rarity, and this is one of the first in this our all-too-brief “Cool Season.” One can never count on many more fine days, so one must enjoy each one as a rare gift. I put my lawn chair outside, but I put it in the shade. I also wore a headband since I sweat whenever I move around, even in our winter; I took off my shirt; and I still put plenty of ice in my big thermos beer mug.

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I’ve been reading a lot of philosophy lately, so I needed music that is non-invasive. (English lyrics disrupt my thinking, and instrumentals are best.) I picked Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons” and played it over and over while reading about dialectical philosophical traditions (Aristotle, Aquinas, Hegel, Marx, Rand) on my Kindle.

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I’m recovering from a bit of a low spell, but I’m on the upward mend. A recent bout of thrombosis has stopped all major exercise, and I am very weak. Going to the hospital every day for a while allowed me to catch a head cold. (Where are contagiously sick people assembled together? At a hospital. A hermit like me rarely mixes with others.)

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One of our cats, Silly Willy, is on death’s door with an untreatable virus, but he was outside today. He is skinny and pathetic, but he’s an old friend, and he sat on my lap while I read. He is still alert and notices birds and other critters that he would have otherwise chased down if he had felt his normal self. Willy and me: two sickies.

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I had a rather confusing wake up at dawn today. (I think that I’ve written about this same illusion before.) While in bed, I looked out the window (without my glasses on) and saw white fluttering things around the blossoming tree/hedge on the perimeter wall. While we sometimes forget the month of the year here because of such a different climate, I was well aware of it being December. So I thought: okay, those are snowflakes dancing over the tree. Wait a minute … it doesn’t snow here, and trees don’t normally blossom in snow. What is happening? I put on my glasses and resolved the issue. It was a bunch of butterflies hovering around the pink blossoms. It’s a geographical confusion.

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Tonight may be my best chance of seeing the Geminid meteor showers if I go up on our roof. Previous nights have been too cloudy – we seldom ever see stars or clear skies here – but I will venture up there tonight in a last-ditch effort for some (beloved) astronomical viewing. City lights and tropical haze make frustrating obstacles to seeing the beautiful night skies. All I want is a peek.

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-Zenwind.

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01 December 2014

Yep, Thrombosis Again

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I went to the local hospital today and got to see the doctor who treated me three years ago for a case of thrombosis in my right leg. He ordered bloodwork and ultrasound, which detected a blood clot in my left leg. I'm taking meds for it and will visit the hospital every day for a while until the anti-colagulent level is fine tuned. I'm glad I caught it fast this time around.

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-Zenwind.

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28 November 2014

Thrombosis Again?

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I’m limping. And sulking about it. My lower left leg is lamed, and I’m afraid it might be a recurrence of the thrombosis I had a couple of years ago. If it becomes visibly swollen I will have to go to the doctor.

Not being able to walk, to fully stride out and wander, is a personal blow to my very identity. I am a walker, a rambler, and a wandering hiker by nature, and to not be able to freely walk about is like a prison sentence for me.

The previous thrombosis episode started the same way: I felt what I thought was a muscle cramp in my calf, but careful stretching didn’t help. It got worse and swelled up alarmingly.

The cause of this present lameness episode seems to be my inactivity last weekend, when for two whole days I sat and caught up with a huge backload of email correspondence and did nothing but sit and type. And beyond that, I spent a long spell in late October reading the great biography, "Mao: the untold story", and writing a review of it. Inactivity is poison. Activity is life.

I hope I’m wrong and that this crippling leg problem is not a thrombosis flare-up. But whatever the cause of it, I cannot wait to get back on my feet again.

-Zenwind.

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22 November 2014

Hunger Games in Real Time

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The latest Hunger Games movie, Mockingjay – Part 1, started Thursday in Thai theaters, and some students have been using the “three-fingered salute” protest gesture – that in the films are targeted against the totalitarian Capitol – against the real life military government that is in place since the May 22 military coup. The students are arrested for it, but they are released after being held a while and talked to. The generals know that the world is watching them.

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Thursday was my monthly meet up with friends in the city, so I left early to get in two movies before evening. I didn’t see Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1 because it is playing most places and will be around a while. (Maybe.) I saw Whiplash for the second time; it is one of the best movies I’ve seen recently, and the performance by J.K. Simmons is absolutely astonishing. I also saw Interstellar, which was one hell of a ride.

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Before leaving home I had read in local news reports that the Apex theater group (Lido and Scala theaters in the heart of Bangkok) was suddenly canceling their Thursday showing of Hunger Games at the Scala. Apparently someone was trying to buy up and distribute a huge number of tickets, possibly setting up a mass protest against our present system of martial law. Apex is said to have canceled the movie on its own with no order from the generals. I planned to see Whiplash at Lido, and I immediately saw military and police presence on the way there. No incidents happened that I know of. Friday, three students were arrested for flashing the three-fingered salute at Scala.

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I saw my second film at Siam Paragon theaters, and the place was swarming with military and police, with some VIP military folks under heavy escort. In the evening I got on the crowded Skytrain to go to my meeting place, and found myself standing face to face with a young Thai teenager in a Boy Scout uniform. I caught myself before I gave him the traditional Boy Scout salute – which is with three fingers, like the protest salute in Hunger Games!

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-Zenwind.

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09 November 2014

Technical Problems

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Both of my main blogs will be silent for a while, until I sort out some of the blogs's bugs, some problems with appearance and line spacing that suddenly kicked up and ambushed me out of nowhere.

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Today was the first real sunshine day in many months, and I was roasted a bit while out walking. I look forward to the clear night when I can see stars.

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-Zenwind.

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20 October 2014

Mozart, Radio, Hard Times, & the “Jupiter” Symphony

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This is why I love radio.  Radio is random, throwing unexpected and often unfamiliar music at me, and it educates me when radio DJs (who are called “hosts” on Classical stations) give me bits of historical background on composers and compositions. 
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I try to listen to streaming radio whenever possible, and the Classical station from MPR (Minnesota Public Radio) is one of my favorites as background when trying to think, read, and write.  Tonight (my Monday evening) I’m listening to MPR’s Monday morning show from their 7:00AM hour.  I’m 12 hours ahead of them. 
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Are you familiar with Mozart’s “Jupiter” Symphony (No.41)?  Its first movement has hints of struggles but it cannot help breaking out into rousing triumphal glory.  It makes you want to just stand up and cheer, twist and shout.  Such strength, joy, and optimism! 
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The MPR host introduced the above movement from Mozart’s “Jupiter” by telling us how bleak Mozart’s personal world was at the time he composed it.  Austria was at war with the Ottomans, and no one was attending theaters for any operas or concerts.  Mozart and his wife had just lost a daughter who died before reaching one year of age, and they were too poor to pay the undertaker.  He couldn’t make money composing, and he could barely manage by teaching untalented students, an endeavor that always depressed him.  Hard times. 
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Yet somehow during this depressing period of Mozart’s life, he produced the wonderful “Jupiter” Symphony. 
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-Zenwind.

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18 October 2014

Monsoon Turnover

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The rainy monsoon winds from the Indian Ocean are almost ending, and the dry monsoon winds from mainland Asia are beginning.  I felt it today when out walking.  The direct sun was hot, but the air had a different feel – drier. 
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On my walk to the store and back, half of the way was in shade and half in sun.  A truck came by hosing down the streets with water.  The street surfaces had been in the hot sun, and I crossed an intersection immediately after it had been dowsed with water.  The dense humidity that we are normally used to, from the rising steam, hit me with surprise, because the air elsewhere today was much drier.  But after crossing this area of humidity I entered a shady walkway, and the relief was striking.  
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Looking forward to our all-too-brief Cool season. 
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-Zenwind.

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16 September 2014

Before the Rain ...

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My projects are half-completed
yet done so with great satisfaction,
by the time my back starts hurting,
terribly and inevitably.
So, it's time to call it a day,
because a big storm is rolling in. 
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I put my chair in the shade
where the best breezes flow,
and I pour cold beer over ice,
waiting for the cooler breezes,
and I open a book. 
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Winds rise, skies darken, thunder rumbles,
and the world scrambles in fear:
Pinkie the Cat runs in a
desperate comical low-crawl dash
to some outside retreat.
Silly Willy loses his nerve and goes inside. 
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Then the Black Dog, a fat old soi dog
with gray whiskers who often shows
up for food, waddles by.
He is afraid of me - though not
afraid of gentle Tuk when she's here.
I wave, say "Hi," and talk to him in friendly
nonsense phrases while I slowly push some tuna
that the cats didn't eat
through the fence for him.
I back off to give him space and courage to eat.
He eats it up; I approach again,
give him tuna, and again back off; he eats;
we repeat this dance until the
tuna is gone and he is happy. 
As he turns to go, we part as friends.
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Cosmic bodhisattva Black Dog,
thank you for enlightening my world. 
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-Zenwind.
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… Rain at Last

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Holding down the home fort in the
outside courtyard on a Buddha Day,
through the hot afternoon right through
to the rain before dark.

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I'm glad my phone is waterproof,
because I'm getting drizzled on
mightily by the blowing rain and spray
here under the meager eaves as I type this.
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The coolness of this downpour
is such a radical drop in temp
that I can hardly contain my joy. 

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Blessed Coolness. Zen Delight.
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-Zenwind. 

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12 September 2014

Pain

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Chronic physical pain.  Acute, agonizing, excruciating, chronic, and intensely brutal continuing physical pain.  Pain that saps the very life right out of you.  My back hurts so bad that it hurts to even breathe.  Hell on earth. 
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It drives me down into the depths and makes me empathize with old Sisyphus as he goes through the endless and hopeless cyclical motions of his ancient curse.  (See Albert Camus’s essay on The Myth of Sisyphus to encounter what is actually a rather “cheerful” account of such existential predicaments.) 
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 It’s far worse if one’s painful condition is not uniformly recognized by the medical “establishment.”  Some doctors sympathize, but most just don’t understand how much it hurts.  Or give a shit.  They won’t give you legal (but controlled) pain relief medication that might help.  I most often see that very lack of remedy to be a despicable failing of the medical community.  Lack of caring (“for poor suffering creatures everywhere” – Jack Kerouac). 
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Here I am – feeling sorry for myself.  Poor, poor, pitiful me.  I get unbelievably ugly when I’m hurting.  Not a nice guy. 
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I admit that I don’t entirely know what medications would help relieve my acute pain.  I suppose that morphine or other narcotic pain-relievers would work in the short term, but how dangerous and addictive is that?  Sounds like bad complications.  Alcohol is the only legal short-term relief, but that’s an ancient one with its own complications. 
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I hurt my back in the early 1970s while doing farm work.  But really, I must ask:  is it a coincidence that my major acute FMS pain started its present intensity in early 1982 after I had stopped smoking the great cannabis herb (on New Year’s Day 1980) and also had become stupidly enmeshed within the most super-stressful relationship of my entire life shortly after that?  Worst decade of my entire life.  I cannot prove any of it, but I do know for sure that my physical agony started then, along with total mental anguish.  Self-sacrifice is so primitively brutal and self-destroying. 
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Dukkha happens.  That’s the way of it.  We are born; we live; we suffer; and we die.  But – importantly, intriguingly – in between those gates of pain we do have instances of grasping the precious gem and really living.  And we are (sometimes) rational animals who pilot our courses in astonishingly interesting directions.  That’s our glory.  We climb mountains and discover new worlds.  We have a poetic tradition of hope. 
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I don’t know what else to say.  The pain is still reverberating deep throughout my very bones, and my mind is completely exhausted. 
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-Zenwind.
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19 August 2014

Monsoon

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Alone at noon in the courtyard shade.
Heretically, I'm "facing wine" on a Buddha Day.
I read the poetry of Han Shan and Shih te, 
contemplating the Taoist and Ch'an/Zen mountain traditions.
Silly Willy the Cat and I listen to birdsongs in wonder, 
and the occasional breeze is so unexpectedly fresh.
Then the rain.
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-Zenwind. 
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08 August 2014

Finally, Justice for Khmer Rouge Leaders

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A Cambodian court, the Khmer Rouge Tribunal (backed by the UN) has convicted two former Khmer Rouge leaders, Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan, of crimes against humanity and sentenced them to life in prison.  A bit late, but better than nothing. 
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The Khmer Rouge under Pol Pot and his communist intellectual henchmen killed around two million Cambodians in their late-1970s attempt to engineer utopia.  The deaths were caused by a combination of starvation and disease, caused by insane economic and social engineering schemes, and outright execution of most educated Cambodians as well as those put on a hit list by someone’s whim.  Over 20,000 mass graves have been found, aka the Killing Fields, with evidence of nearly one-and-a-half million executions.  It was madness. 
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Nuon Chea studied in Bangkok.  He was known during the height of Khmer Rouge power as Brother Number Two (to Pol Pot’s position as Brother Number One).  I wrote about him a few years ago in a review of the movie “Enemies of the People” (2009), in which he was featured. 
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Khieu Samphan studied in Paris with Pol Pot and other Cambodian communist intellectuals in the 1950s, getting his Ph.D. in economics from the University of Paris in 1959.  During the red terror he was Cambodia’s head of state, yet under Pol Pot’s ultimate control. 
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Both men are in their 80s, so their lives in prison will not be long ones.  (Pol Pot died in 1998, never seeing trial.)  They both face an additional charge of genocide.  Stay tuned. 
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-Zenwind.

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01 August 2014

August: Lammas Day/ Lughnasadh

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The first of August, the festival of the First Harvest.  Sometimes I really do miss those seasonal changes in the cold north and the wild blackberries of August.  Here the rainy monsoon season provides occasional cooler weather, but it alternates with muggy heat at unexpected times. 
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A note on my blog posting:  I have a bit of writer’s block and am not writing much these days.  I have been reading like mad but have not been able to keep up with review writing.  I have several book and movie reviews in draft, but they don’t seem to want to finish themselves. 
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-Zenwind.

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06 July 2014

The Impermanence of Life

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My wife, Tuk, and I have no children and we are quite the isolated hermits socially, so our animal pets are especially dear to us.  They die and leave us too soon.  Our beloved cats are falling sick now.  Life is impermanent (“anicca,” in Pali Buddhist lingo). It will not last.  
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Thai people do not believe in euthanasia for suffering animals, and I think their belief is cruel.  However, I can do nothing about it since the veterinarians here refuse to put them down.  This belief is an aspect of their karma beliefs, and my own differ on this. 
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Since I moved to Thailand, Tuk’s three dogs have died.  One died suddenly – and my father-in-law suggested that it was bitten by a deadly pit viper within our small compound.  (Indeed, one day while sitting out in the shade of our tiny courtyard I followed the intense gaze of one of our cats up to the tin kitchen roof overhead – a beautiful green snake was winding amongst the trees and layers of roofing right over me.  I looked it up in my reference books, and it was undoubtedly such a lethal pit viper.) 
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Another dog of Tuk’s was a nasty cuss who never liked me, a mangy, pitiful but robust canine.  He got terribly sick suddenly – I’m sure it was from eating a chicken bone – and he lay down out back moaning and crying out for over a couple of days and nights.  I would get up in the night and sit with him on a little stool, talking to him and touching him until he quieted down a bit.  I remember one night nodding off a bit while sitting with him, and he woke me by tensing up his ears.  I looked behind us, and in my flashlight’s beam I caught the undulating movement of a huge reptilian tail (of a monitor lizard) disappearing down into a hole in the ground.  Spooky.  The dog finally died, but not before we had reconciled our differences a bit and made peace. 
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The last dog, Macky, was a wonderful, goofy, stinky old mutt.  He lived in the house, and he thought I was nuts because I talked to him all the time in a strange tongue.  I think his heart gave out in the end.  He had been failing, and he went back to the toilet area to lie down.  I was the only one home, and I stayed with him.  I couldn’t help but think of Jack Kerouac’s genuine compassion for “poor suffering creatures everywhere.”  I told Macky that he was a good dog and that if Buddhist rebirth is true (which I do not actually believe), then he would build upon his virtue in this life to find better opportunity for achieving virtue in the next one.  Without breaking eye contact with me, Macky soon had his final seizure and expired.  We miss the old guy. 
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Now our cats are sick and dying.  Mommy Kitty has disappeared outside for three days now, and in her emaciated condition she cannot survive the hard rains that hit us daily.  I have searched everywhere for her, but she hid herself well.  I was her favorite (after her kittens had all grown up), and she slept at my feet.  I still roll over carefully in the night out of habit, so as not to disturb her.  I think she is gone, and I regret that I did not get to spend time with her in her last hours.  I will write a full tribute to her at another time. 
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Silly Willy (who really adores Tuk and can never stay away from her) is ravaged by a virus that the vet said is chronic, fatal, and incurable.  We have thought he was on the threshold of death many times, but he is a stubborn guy and won’t go out without a fight.  He is skeleton-thin and struggling, and we assure him that we are in his corner. 
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“Poor suffering creatures everywhere.”
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-Zenwind.

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21 June 2014

The Rock Pub: Bangkok’s House of Rock

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Back again!  The curfew has finally been lifted, so nightlife in Bangkok is slowly getting back on its feet.  I hadn’t been to the Rock Pub in a long, long time, and finally got my chance. 
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I had taken the express boat into town at noon and soon had a rucksack packed full of books, making my back ache badly.  I then met with good friends in Bangkok for dinner conversation, the high point of every month for me.  But, as everybody was going to leave for home early, I made quick plans for an alternate location to get a taxi home.  I took the Skytrain straight to the Rock Pub, which is on the way home with good taxi spots. 
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I walked into the Rock Pub at 23:00 hours sharp, and the band had just ended a number.  Only a half dozen people in the whole place.  I went to an empty front table, put down my heavy pack, stretched my hurting back, and ordered a beer.  I was horribly thirsty and in great need of pain relief. 
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The band was Munson and they immediately started the next number:  “Smoke on the Water” (“fire in the sky”).  I knew that I had found the right spot.  Then it was AC/DC’s thundering “Highway to Hell,” and I knew I was on that old familiar road.  The beer was cold and went down well. 
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Munson are masters of Rock.  Long hair right out of the 70s, they looked like they were tough veterans of the Rock and Roll wars with years under their belts.  I walked into a perfect time warp.  Without missing a note or a beat, they pounded out great covers of 70s and 80s Rock.  The sound was a torrent of thoracic-thumping, Heavy Metal thunder, shaking right through to my core.  It was a beautiful night. 
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I don’t know all the details of Heavy Metal songs or bands, because I wasn’t collecting albums in those days.  I only heard the songs on car radio while on the road.  So I can name only a few bands or tunes covered from Munson’s set:  Metallica.  “Iron Man.” “Knockin’ on Heaven’s Door” (by Bob Dylan, but a Guns N Roses cover).  AC/DC.  “Sweet Child of Mine.”  Guns N Roses’ “Welcome to the Jungle.”  And on and on with great Heavy Metal covers until 01:00 closing time. 
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Rock lives on! The Rock Pub endures!  
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-Zenwind.

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08 June 2014

Peaceful Expression in Bangkok

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The Royal Thai Army military junta, holding absolute rule since the recent coup d'etat, has prohibited public protests against their seizure of power.  Their clampdown is reasonably effective, in that they are nipping any flash mob protests in the bud.  (I guess they are adapting to modern social media immediacy and launching rapid response teams to potential protest sites.)  Sundays seem to be the biggest day for protests, so they are active today.  A couple of city parks have been closed by troops because of rumors of protest activity.
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Protester tactics have been evolving quickly.  One silent protest gesture from several days ago is the "three-fingered salute" from The Hunger Games movies, in defiance of the martial law regime.  Damn, it's also the traditional Boy Scout salute, so be careful who you greet in the city!  They have been arresting anyone who gives the three-fingered salute.  Really!  Arresting them. No lie.
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Getting around this cause of arrest, flash mob participants have been gathering in public places with the military only finding them "eating sandwiches and reading books" (no three-fingered salutes).  That's got to be frustrating for a "Fed" to find only peaceful folk doing peaceful things.  Can't bust them for that.  Maybe, if they are diligent, they can bust them for littering their sandwich bags.
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There is a lot of irony and subtle humor in these actions, but this signals what everyone knows:  that martial law must someday give way to civilian law.  The sooner the better.
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So far, few have been killed or maimed in these protests, making it much safer to be about than before, but this state of affairs will get old soon.  These days ahead will be a test of Thai character and reasonableness.  "May you live in interesting times!"
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-Zenwind.
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03 June 2014

Easing into the Rainy Season

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We have occasionally cooler weather when the clouds block the sun, and a strong rain usually relieves the constant heat.  The monsoon rains have been late this year, but they are welcomed whenever we can get them. 
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Our neighborhood Royal Thai Army “Emergency Rapid Deployment Force” that is bunkered down at the corner police station is well-armed.  As well as some sort of Humvee-like vehicle, they have a light machine gun as well as multiple assault rifles.  I passed their bunker today when they were changing guard, and I caught a look at their standard weapons drill, e.g., checking live ammo from the last shift, etc.  
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Because of my own super-strict Marine training, I was a bit alarmed at the random way they were pointing their weapons as they locked in a live magazine into their rifles (if not, hopefully, having a chambered round in them).  I think that this military institution has not had enough bad historical experience with accidental live fire disasters to get truly radical with weapons safety rules.  Our standard Vietnam War weapons rules were rigid and uncompromising.  I cringed as I walked past their relatively careless procedures with weapons and ammo, and I will in the future avoid being anywhere nearby at their change of guard. 
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Other than that, most of us feel more secure and safe now – except for that inconvenient curfew of midnight to 0400. 
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Movie Review:  X-Men: the days of future past (2014).  It was a great film, making good use of several of its fine actors.  What I really loved was the travel back to 1973, a classic year, one that I somewhat remember.  Yet I wish they would have picked better representative examples of the music of that era.  A bit of harder rock and Southern rock would have made it perfect. How about Elvis' "Aloha from Hawaii" broadcast?  Pink Floyd's "Dark Side of the Moon"?  The Who's "Quadrophenia"? And most importantly, the Allman Brothers Band's "Ramblin' Man," and also the birth of AC/DC?  
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-Zenwind.

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30 May 2014

Siam Is One of a Kind

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As we transition through into absolute martial law under this most recent and temporary military coup d’etat regime, not much really seems to have changed, at least from my perspective outside Bangkok.  The curfew has been adjusted down to only midnight to 0400, and we still have essential services.  I can buy milk, eggs, cold beer, and ice with no interruptions of service.  Traffic is only jumbled in the city proper when certain protests/ military responses happen at isolated spots. 
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Locally, the only presence is a squad of armed soldiers at the corner police station, and they have built up a low bunker of sandbags, from which they monitor the main road intersections.  No one pays them much mind as we go about our business. 
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Here is an unrelated mystery that has taken me eight long years to comprehend.  I always wondered why our supply of eggs that I buy at the market depletes so quickly.  I buy a “dozen” eggs routinely, but they run out immediately.  Why?  It just dawned on me.  A “Thai dozen” of eggs, in a transparent plastic container, is not an English dozen.  It consists of only 10 eggs!  I only just now counted them.  I’m a slow learner. 
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As usual, it is hotter than Hell here and infinitely more humid.  But we get occasional relief from the stray thunderstorm that the monsoon season graces us with.  The rains are awesome.  They cleanse the nostrils and sweep away the filth under our feet.  A renewal.  Blessed coolness.  Zen delight. 
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-Zenwind.

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25 May 2014

Disgusted, Bored, and Sick of it All

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Protests, martial law, curfew, coup d’etat.…  I am disgusted with the speeches and behaviors shown on almost all sides of these Thai conflicts.  I’m bored of reading the news and trying to keep up with all of it.  Just when I thought the country couldn’t dig itself into a deeper hole….  It is truly a cultural civil war, and I see no end in sight. 
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So I’ve been reading books on mountaineering history and trying to stay offline as much as possible.  I did check my email briefly this morning and then the weather report.  The latter said that there was only a very low chance of any rain – followed an hour later by a deluge that sent us scrambling to close windows and bring laundry in. 
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I’m writing this in case anyone back home is worried about us here.  We are okay and most likely will be.  I am sick of covering the news here, bored to death with it.  In case I don’t update this blog much during this Thai crisis, I recommend two English language online new sites here: 
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One of my favorite columnists there is Vorani Vanijaka, who writes every Sunday and Thursday.   In this post he appears to be about as disgusted as I am. 
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The Nation.
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And, finally, some astute observations by social scientists. ;-) 
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Oh, and to any of you cosmic hitchhikers:  Happy Towel Day!
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-Zenwind.

23 May 2014

Surprising Normalcy

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One day after General Prayuth, the chief of the Royal Thai Army declared a coup d’etat and suspended the constitution, few things appear to have changed – at least in our neighborhood. 
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I went out today (in the midday sun) to buy groceries and to check on the availability of essential items.  If the nationwide curfew says that no one can be out of their house from 10PM to 5AM, how will stores get re-stocked?  Coming home from late-night excursions in the past, I have seen many trucks and workers re-stocking.  I don’t know if there are exceptions made now or if stores get around it.  Time will tell. 
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Traffic patterns were normal today.  The only neighborhood extras were armed soldiers at the police station and at a key intersection.  I had easy access to the essentials, finding adequate supplies of milk, eggs, ice, and cold beer.  Civilization endures, at least for the moment. 
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-Zenwind.

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22 May 2014

Coup D'etat in Thailand Today, Again

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Late afternoon news here informs us that the Royal Thai military establishment has declared a coup d'etat, a taking over of all government authority.  A curfew has been decreed:  we cannot venture out of our homes from 10PM to 5AM.  That's really gonna disrupt our infamous nightlife.  All radio and TV stations seem to have been taken over by the military, and they are playing patriotic music perhaps to inspire everyone.  (Eek!)  The local internet news is slow-to-dead, as everyone is trying to get the word.  Apparently, the two major sides on the fundamental political divide cannot compromise after two days of Army-mediated pow-wows, and General Prayuth says, "Okay, we'll do it my way."
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As a radical lover of liberty, I can complain about the injustice of such a seizure of absolute power, and I could cite centuries of philosophical argument to back me up.  But since Thailand is my adopted home and I'm used to it, what in the hell do I expect?  Gotta live with it, albeit with embarrassment.  Sometime, somehow, all this will pass.  This is part of "normal" here.  Yet, as for the immediate future, all bets are off.
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The question on everyone's mind is:  what will the Red Shirts do next?  Earlier, they had vowed to draw the line if their complete elected government was ousted, threatening to take violently to the streets against the Army again if this happened.  Well, it happened.  Or did it?  I'm reading confusing stuff in the news, sometimes reading that the military claims that the government officials are to continue in their everyday functions.  Some news reports say that the Red Shirts at the west Bangkok protest site are returning to their up-country homes.  Will they stage a massive assault on Bangkok later when they can organize? Who knows?
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Apparently, the military agrees with a minority that true constitutional reform must come before new elections are held.  The present constitutional milieu allows anyone with enough votes to assume all the power of a tyrant, and the court system allows the elites to hold power far beyond their numbers.  It's a constitutional nightmare, a loose cannon situation.
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Thomas Jefferson's take on the importance of extra strong constitutional restraints on any political power is relevant here:  "The two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second down with the chains of the Constitution so the second will not become the legalized version of the first."
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Our life here is not disrupted too much.  (Except for that dreadful martial music!)
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-Zenwind.
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20 May 2014

Martial Law Update

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(See today’s earlier post below.)  I walked the neighborhood loop this noon, and everything looked normal.  The only soldiers I saw were two positioned in front of our corner police station with their M16s.  They looked uncomfortable in the heat. 
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As a voluntaryist libertarian, it is a repugnant experience for me to witness the military seizing absolute police power, even if temporarily.  If we really must kneel down and have any government (with its policing power) to lord over us at all, usually an elected one is better than an unelected one.  Democratically elected governments often -- but do not always -- shuffle the better of the wolves to the top of the pathetic power heap.  That doesn’t seem to work here in Thailand where a weak constitution allows majority-elected wolves to be rampant loose-cannon despots who think they have the mandate to plunder what they can and punish whomever they oppose. 
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As F.A. Hayek pointed out, when immense power is constitutionally available, the worst of the wolves get on top.  If the constitution severely limits power, then the wolves are not interested; they will turn back to their underground Mafioso ways. 
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What is the lesser of the many political evils today in Thailand?  The Thaksinista regime wants a tyranny of the majority with a mandate to do anything they please.  Suthep and his anti-government legions want an ill-defined “reform” under unnamed unelected authorities.  Neither side will budge from their dogmatic (and equally special-interest) positions.  And the country is divided behind them. 
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A lot of folks here are relieved that the Royal Thai Army has stepped in to stop the building cycle of violence (if they indeed can stop it).  This seems to be somewhat true of both sides of the political divide, since things are at an absolute impasse. 
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The Army’s seizure of power through martial law – which they insist is only temporary – has an analogue in the ancient Roman Republic, where a Roman citizen was appointed as temporary military “dictator” in special emergencies and only for the duration of that emergency, after which he would stand down and give political power back to the Roman citizens.  (I am not excusing it.  I’m merely pointing out the Roman Republic, with some of its constitutional restraints, was infinitely better than the following Roman Empire that crushed all liberty.) 
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But who appointed Army Commander-in-chief General Prayuth as dictator here?  (Well, he did, with the might of the military as his strongest backup argument.)  Will he return power to civilians after he has the two sides talk it out?  History says that the Thai military usually does so after things shake out, and few think that Prayuth has the ambition for further power in the future.  But times are a-changing and the “old ways” are not as satisfying to a modern citizenry who has heard of more peaceful means.  The Army is not going to be able to pull this one off many more times. 
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General Prayuth is a royalist conservative, so the Red Shirt Thaksinistas do not trust him.  They demand that he treat all sides in the conflict fairly and equally if there is to be any negotiated reconciliation.  The Reds have complained of being victims of “double standards” and unequal treatment in the past from the courts and the entrenched elite power structure, and they have a very valid point.  The doctrine of the Rule of Law, from Hammurabi to Moses to Cicero, Locke and Jefferson, has evolved to demand equal standards before the law.  For everyone. 
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As General Prayuth and the Army try to bring all sides together to hammer out a fair political solution, it is a historic opportunity for the Thai military to prove its worth as a respectable national institution.  But today, it’s the only game in town. 
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-Zenwind.

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Thailand under Martial Law

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Early this morning the Royal Thai Army declared martial law throughout the kingdom, but it insists that this is not a coup.  The present caretaker government is still in place, but the Army is taking control of all security and will censor whatever media it sees fit for the time being. 
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In 2006 the Army did stage a coup, ousting then Prime Minister Thaksin and his government.  As they did today, the Army moved in the early morning hours, and the nation wakes up to the news. 
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Since the anti-government demonstrations started six months ago, over two dozen people have died and hundreds wounded in violent clashes between them and the pro-government Red Shirts.  Neither group will stand down.  Evidently the Army thinks it can stop the cycle of violence, but that will depend on the Reds next move.  The Reds are hard-core tough, and they have no love for the Army. 
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Here is a good article from The Nation about “What the Martial Law Entails.”  Here is an article from the Bangkok Post. 
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I plan to take a cautious walk about the immediate neighborhood today to check things out. 
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Latest news:  Army prohibits TV broadcasts from radical stations on both sides of the political divide, those of the Red Shirts and of the anti-government camp.  (This is where Twitter is actually useful:  up-to-the-minute news flashes.) 
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-Zenwind.

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12 May 2014

Recent Readings

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It has been the hot, hot season here, and it’s been too hot and humid to type.  But I have been reading like a maniac.  I had hoped to review, if only briefly, what I’ve been reading, but I lost track of all of them. 
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The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (2006) by Lawrence Wright is a masterful work of investigative journalism.  Wright goes right to the heart of the matter:  the religious-ideological background of modern Islamic terrorist jihad.  He first covers the life, the “martyrdom,” and the vast influence of Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966), the Egyptian academic who inspired Osama bin Laden and his fundamentalist comrades.  He traces the sequence of radicalization and plotting, also showing what agents in American intelligence agencies were thinking at this time.  Highly recommended. 
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No Shortcuts to the Top:  Climbing the world’s 14 highest peaks (2006) by Ed Viesturs.  Viesturs is one of America’s greatest high-altitude mountain climbers, and he is the first American to climb all 14 of the earth’s summits that are over 8,000 meters, all of which are in Asia’s Himalaya and Karakorum ranges.  And he climbed them all without using supplemental bottled oxygen. 
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I already had Viesturs’ book, Himalayan Quest (2009), which covers the same climbing campaign but is a National Geographic edition with large format photography featured.  Reading them both together was a treat.  Viesturs had other writers contribute to the text of both books, but most photos were his.  My favorite quote is from Viesturs’ sometimes climbing partner, the late great Jean-Christophe Lafaille, who once climbed the huge Himalayan mountain Shishapangma by a new route, solo, in winter; Lafaille said, “Never in my life have I been so cold!”  Whew!  That takes me away from the tropics for a bit. 
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Parkland (2013) by Vincent Bugliosi, tells the story of the “four days in November” (1963) in which JFK was killed as was Lee Harvey Oswald.  Bugliosi was a top prosecutor who became quite famous for prosecuting the Charles Manson family murders and writing about the case.  I have read quite a bit about the JFK assassination, but his details about Oswald and his family, about the criminal investigation, and about Jack Ruby are fascinating.  This book is more of a movie tie-in edition since the film of the same name recently appeared, and all of this is based on his huge 2007 work on the subject. 
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Lady Chatterley’s Lover (1928) by D.H. Lawrence is perhaps the most infamous dirty book of the early 20th century, since it was banned in places and there were high-profile court cases surrounding it.  I finally read it and was surprised that it was not all bad as a story.  Rated X for language and sexual scenarios. 
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Under the Skin (2000) by Michel Faber.  I saw that the new film version of this was coming soon, and I wanted to see it because critics said it was unusual in many ways, and also because Scarlett Johansson stars.  So I quickly get a Kindle version of the book and read it before seeing the film.  I liked both, but they are not for everyone.  Kinda weird.  After reading this book, I got another Faber book, The Fire Gospel (2008).  I liked his earlier book better. 
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I have collected a lot of science fiction novels by Robert A. Heinlein, both in paper and Kindle.  I will review them on Zenwind eventually, as I am finding them to be among my favorites in my long life of reading. 
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-Zenwind.

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25 April 2014

Annual Immigration Run

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This morning Tuk and I successfully completed my annual Extension of Stay in the Kingdom based on Retirement (i.e., my annual retirement "visa renewal").  It is the major headache of the year, with Immigration usually throwing unexpected new requirements at us each year.  Our running list of paperwork requirements has grown quite large, so we arrive with reams of paper -- copies of everything we can think of, and more, in duplicate.
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After we presented our paperwork to the official's satisfaction, she told us to wait in the general seating area while she stamped everything properly.  Another American guy was right in line before us, and the official was processing both our passports and papers at the same time, in order to use all the different rubber stamps in order.  As I watched, I thought:  she could easily mix up our paperwork.
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Sure enough, I saw her pick up the other guy's passport while working on my papers.  (My passport is a bit ragged from marching around with it in the humidity and rain, and it stands out.)  She was comparing numbers and then got a very confused look on her face.  It took a few seconds, but then she reached for my passport and got it right.  (I must say in her defense, that's got to be a boring job.)
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I re-checked that all the stamps were correct, and then we were good to go.  This may have been the smoothest annual Extension of Stay trip we've ever done, with only a bare minimal of domestic strife in the long buildup to this, the year's major stressor.
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Years ago we had to go deep into downtown Bangkok to an Immigration Office, and when finished we would hit the Hard Rock Cafe for a cool drink with lunch.  But now we must go out into the wilds of outer Nonthbaburi.  Getting a taxi to take us out and wait is a major task, but a very good tip will have the driver telling us to call him again next year.
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Returning, I went out for groceries and walked my favorite 2.5k loop by the river at a brisk pace.  Of course, it was "...out in the midday sun."  Like a mad dog, it was exactly noon.  It is 100 degrees F.  I think I'm done for the day.
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-Zenwind.
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22 April 2014

Fashionista Rebels

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It is interesting how fashion has evolved amongst the current anti-government movement here in Thailand.  The visit of their leader, Suthep, into our neighborhood today was fascinating.  He walked by on the street just below my window while greeting his local fans.  I got to rub shoulders with some of these fans later, and I think I’m belatedly witnessing an intriguing emergence of a new “style,” a kind of polite quasi-guerilla chic that is getting very intense.  It’s a bit like the earlier Red Shirt style, but not as hick or thuggish, kind of an urban pose that really does have some authentic cool. 
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Some background:  The anti-government movement is primarily an anti-Thaksin one, and it only exploded into vast numbers late last year when the present government – a puppet government directed by the exiled convicted fugitive Thaksin and headed by his majority-elected sister – tried to sneak through a complete amnesty bill at 4am, a bill that would have erased Thaksin’s own corruption convictions. 
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This anti-government push is mainly a middle-class movement of outrage at this – with the traditional ossified conservative elite giving it their blessings while themselves lacking the guts to march in the streets.  (Thailand’s politics is much more complicated than can be explained here.) 
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It is sweltering here now during our Hot Season.  It was 100 degrees F today, without even factoring in the unbelievably hellish humidity.  This morning I got the rumor that Suthep would be visiting EGAT, the electric company headquarters next to us.  Out of my window I saw his fans waiting for him and trying to get into whatever shade they could – not that it helps that much.  Suthep finally arrived, greeting people just like he is often shown on TV.  There was happy Thai music and an air of celebration. 
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Important note:  Suthep’s once-huge protest crowds have been decreasing remarkably since last year.  Some of that might be because of the heat and the lack of results, but it is more probably because his rhetoric and policy statements have, in time, been veering toward the weird. 
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Originally, he championed the Rule of Law against unlimited majority caprice (reminding me of James Madison’s warning, in The Federalist Papers, against any unrestrained “tyranny of the majority”).  Suthep’s point that Thailand’s legal system needs radical reform is widely accepted, and the egregious corruption of the “Thaksin regime” has angered so many by its undisguised graft in the name of “populism.” 
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But now Suthep has uttered vague suggestions of “appointed” authorities (appointed by whom?) to reform the constitutional regime.  What in the hell does he mean?  Does he want to have himself appointed the Great Lawgiver?  (Many Red Shirts suspect that.)  What are his proposals?   Rule of whose Law?  (That’s a question.)  His vision is nebulous, and his credibility has plummeted even amongst the native Thai, Western-educated analysts here who had once championed him. 
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Back to fashion.  In the early Suthep-led protests late last year, I saw middle class folks in their normal office work clothes:  women in skirts or suits and men in slacks and sports shirts, if not in more formal suits with ties.  In the early mass marches throughout Bangkok, one could see this same dress code as protesters left their jobs at noon lunch break and/or after hours – after all, these were professional working people. 
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Today I saw a difference.  For one thing, it’s hotter.  For another, as the former vast numbers of protestors has dropped, these remaining are the Hard Core.  They’ve been marching throughout Bangkok for months, never giving up, and now it’s hotter than blazing Hell.  I had to go out in the heat today to buy bags of ice and beverages, so I mixed with the protestors and their “Guards” on my normally un-crowded local sidewalks. 
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The “Guards” in the anti-government movement are self-appointed security people who guard Suthep against being kidnapped by government forces or hurt by Red Shirt thugs.  They all have a distinct aura of “cool,” dressed mostly in black, sometimes with fashionable (and expensive!) bullet-proof vests. 
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(Shit! I’m dragging my sorry ass, sweating buckets in the heat, and these folks are often wearing black long-sleeved jackets in the sun!  I really must be an alien.) 
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The Guards sport a lot of black military-style boonie hats, fighting harnesses, and combat boots, and often they have some kind of walky-talky radios with big antennas clipped at their shoulder.  Awesome!  They swagger around and are, without a doubt, the coolest kids on the block. 
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I must admit that the Guards were also rather polite, which surprised me.  I was an overheated farang, blinded by sweat, stumbling along the sidewalk with bags of ice, and it was hard going for me because it was so densely crowded with Guards.  (I’m usually a solitary walker who walks fast on empty sidewalks and avoids crowds.)  One Guard saw my plight and engineered a path for me, telling his buddies that someone needed to get through.  Quite gentlemanly of him. 
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But the height of contemporary protest-chic fashion was witnessed later when the rally broke up and everyone was heading home in the heat.  The hard core rally folk were more colorful, but were primarily dressed in practical clothing for the long hot day.  Blue jeans or fatigues were the norm, even for all the ladies, and shirts were often of brilliant colors and offbeat cut.  They reminded me of latter day hippies, but not nearly as pathetic as the Greenwich Village pseudo-freaks in the late 60s where all the colorful plastic people posed and pranced all about.  These were serious protestors in for the long haul and dressing for the weather (like authentic children of the Earth). 
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Sun protection was all-important.  Everyone had some kind of head covering, and this really distinguished the veteran protestor from the raw boot of yesterday.  Stylish cowboy hats were common, usually light colored and very wide-brimmed.  Many people had towels over their heads and necks to block sun and to soak up sweat.  (This reminds me of my first day in Vietnam, seeing Marines wearing boonie hats with towels around their necks, struggling on under the tropical sun.)  Many today looked like colorful Arabs.  One guy  had a baseball type hat with a beautifully colored cannabis leaf cluster in front, and it sparkled in the sun.  (Is there a more broadly libertarian element here within this mix that I don't know about?) 
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Boonie hats, sometimes colorful but mostly brown/ olive drab, often had colorful sweatbands tied around them.  I can definitely relate.  I don’t usually wear a hat when out and about, but if it really hits the fan and I must, I often wear a camo sweatband under my broad-brimmed boonie hat.  I guess I’m just not as fashionable as these hipsters.  I must be getting old. 
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Many of these folks looked like gypsies.  The lady protestors each had uniquely colorful combinations making up their sun-hats, and everyone was making an individual fashion statement.  Or perhaps they were also trying to beat the heat as best they could while they trudged on toward their political ideal.  Gotta hand it to them.  It was something to see. 
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-Zenwind.

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13 April 2014

Songkran 2014 CE/2557 BE

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Songkran is the traditional Thai/Lao New Year, in the hottest part of the year.  At dawn, I wake up almost naked with nothing but the relief of a strong electric fan, yet sweat pours from my brow.  Sweat City – no respite. 
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Traditionally, water is poured upon the hands of elders and on Buddha images to relieve the heat.  But in recent times Songkran has become an epic water fight amongst youngsters with gallons dumped on anyone within range.  It is too hot to go out, but if I must go out for ice and drinks I dress down for a possible drenching.  Recent years have not been as wet locally as in the past – mainly because of frequent political crises – but one never knows. 
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Our ice supply will last through tomorrow dawn, but I will have to go out for resupply after that.  The unforgiving tropical sun. 
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Blessed coolness.  Zen delight. 
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Happy Birthday to Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), my hero.  “Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” 
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-Zenwind.

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22 March 2014

Brief Rain

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Although the Rainy monsoon season does not normally kick in for another few months, we just had a freak thunderstorm move through at midday.  I couldn’t wait to test out my new pair of sports sandals on the wet pavements and rocks.  They worked wonderfully, gripping like crampons!  They should serve me well for the wet half of the year (while my older pair slips on the wet and is only good for the dry half). 
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It was also nice to step out into the fresh air of an ongoing thunderstorm with its coolness.  The air smells so clean.  Unfortunately, when it stops raining, the steam starts to rise (even without the sun shining), and the humidity makes you wringing wet.  It’s tropical! 
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As I was unloading groceries at home, my back suddenly gave me an amazingly sharp and horrendous pain, pain in my T7 sore spot worse than I’ve had for many, many months – that old feeling like I’d just been hit square on the spine at vertebra T7 with a hard-swung ball bat and then had it crushed by tightening vise-grips.  It hurts to breathe. 
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I did nothing to provoke it, so I suspected the weather – the drop in barometric pressure that accompanies a storm, because this storm was another anomaly.  So, I checked the weather history of our area for recent days.  What I saw was quite a high gradual variability in the pressure within each day.  But what were different were the sharp sudden ups and downs today, with a very sharp drop at the time of my local shopping foray.  Ouch!  
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Dukkha, in some variety, is always a fact of life, hovering just over your shoulder, ready to pounce.  It hurts to type, so I shall stop here. 
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-Zenwind.

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14 March 2014

The Heat Is On

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The Cool Season is over, and we are headed right into the Hot Season.  At dawn today I knew it would be a bad one, with that feeling of muggy, sticky heat. 
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At 2:00 PM it is 97*F with a Heat Index (“feels like”) at 106*F.  Damn!
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-Zenwind.

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11 March 2014

Blues Music in Bangkok: The Jukes

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A young Thai band called the Jukes plays great Blues at Apoteka, on Bangkok’s Sukhumvit soi 11 every Monday night from 21:30 until after midnight.  I’d heard about them, and I finally got to hear them last night.  Fantastic!  The singer also plays a heart-breaking blues harp; makes you want to cry.  The guitarist plays soul-splitting licks, and he broke two strings from his intensity.  The good bassist and drummer round out this very tight group.  They played songs I could not name, which is a change from hearing the same old standards every night.  It’s a younger generation of Bluesmen coming up, and they live it. 
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It is a rare pleasure these days for me to be out to a late live gig, but it did me good.  My back had ached terribly all day long, on the boat coming to Bangkok and during some intensive necessary shopping.  I rested a bit by seeing a movie (“3 Days to Kill” with Kevin Costner; not bad).  But true relief only came after finding a seat with a comfortable back at Apoteka.  Of course, the refreshments they serve kicked in as the definitive anesthetic, and by midnight – after many beers and many good tunes – all my pain was gone.  Blues music is cathartic, it takes you on a tour down deep and you can only go up from there. 
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Apoteka and Soi 11 are interesting places, grittier than my neighborhood.  The pub is partly an open space, even in rainy weather, with the bar and band area inside with many tables under air conditioning, but it is opened wide to a front porch table area so I enjoy watching people walking by on the soi.  Walking down the couple of hundred meters of Soi 11 itself is rather dangerous, because the sidewalks are incredibly narrow and are usually occupied by food vendors, making you walk in the narrow street with its crowded two-way traffic. 
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The beggars here look much worse off than at least the places I’ve been through when walking back from gigs, many of these being mothers with little kids.  The ladies of the night on the late night soi here often look much more forlorn than in other areas, trying hard to sell their bodies and their sorry souls to staggering louts.  One must walk on by many pathetic situations. 
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One young lady had “hooker” written all over her, but she was a class above the others.  She didn’t operate from the street.  Rather she came into the various bars lining the soi and took up a seat on a high stool right near the doorway.  Dressed in a short black skirt, one could not miss her.  Very good looking, neat, and not looking stupid, no doubt she could be pickier about her clientele.  But what of the years ahead?  If she’s lucky, and smart, she may find a tolerable husband soon, but the clock is ticking. 
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On a brighter note, my shopping expedition earlier in the day was very successful.  I desperately needed a new backpack for everyday rough duty, and I always buy a new pair of sports sandals before the rainy season.  My present pack (an excellent North Face “Recon”) is about five years old and has given me wonderful service, but I am afraid the big zippers will blow out soon from overloading it with books or groceries every day.  I couldn’t find another “Recon” in the city, but I found a great replacement daypack from The North Face (a “Hot Shot II”) that should last me five years or so.  Both these packs have a feature I demand: a good system of compression straps to make it slim in profile while traveling until I need to expand it for loads. 
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I had been having problems finding good sandals.  The pair I’m wearing now are great except for a tendency to slip on wet surfaces – not a good thing in humid Thailand – so I will wear them only in the dry season.  I got a fantastic deal on this year's new pair of sandals from a Rockport store.  The tread should grip well in wet conditions, but I won’t really know until the rubber hits the (wet) road.  
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-Zenwind.

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24 February 2014

Weekend Violence in Thailand

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There has been a lot of killing in Bangkok and upcountry this last weekend, and the killers are of somewhat uncertain connections.  The firearm and grenade attacks have targeted anti-government protest sites, but in both Trat and in Bangkok nearby children have been killed while either eating noodles or shopping with parents, and this has added a new sickening dimension.  
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“Collateral damage” is the euphemism that the government of the United States of Dubya/Obama uses when American bombs kill innocent non-American bystanders in its never ending imperial wars, but it is evil recklessness on the part of the actor no matter who that is, governments or independent actors.  It is an evil disregard for life. 
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Here is an earlier photo of a young brother and sister killed right in the heart of Bangkok’s shopping district when they were with their father. (Please let me know if this link doesn’t work.) 
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-Zenwind.

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18 February 2014

Police, Riots, and Death

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Today there was bloodshed in Bangkok as police tried to move against and evacuate the die-hard anti-government protesters.  It appears that today certain radical goons on the protesters’ side started the lethal fire with firearms and grenades.  One police officer was shot dead and several were wounded.  Predictably, the police used lethal fire in response, and there were dead and wounded among the protesters. 
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It is like a re-play of 10 April 2010, when the Red Shirts were the protesters and from whose ranks deadly fire killed military men trying to clear them out of protest sites, with the predictable deadly counter-fire.  The hate and violence just cycles round and round. 
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Tomorrow (Wednesday) promises a big anti-government rally, with who knows what consequences?  The day after (Thursday) I am planning to be in the city all day until late meeting friends.  Coming home late might be a problem if too much shit hits the fan, but I’ll deal with it when the time comes, as I'm sick of being limited by this civil warfare.  
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Twitter updates from those monitoring the action are a good way to stay informed about dangerous parts of the city.  Mobile internet is earning its keep. 
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-Zenwind.

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01 February 2014

Eve of Thai Elections: Gunfights and Explosions

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Wounded lying in the streets. 
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After only two or three hours since last consulting it, my Twitter feed (@Northwindhermit) alerted me to 87 unread Tweets!  That signifies that news is happening fast on the streets.  Folks in the wrong place at the wrong time are being shot or pinned down by gunfire.  Literally, it’s bloody awful.  Violence goons from both sides of the divide are getting in their trigger time. 
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Tomorrow is a national election day in Thailand, albeit a highly disputed and controversial election that will most probably solve nothing in this fractured land that is on the brink of cultural civil war.  The political idiocy will just go on and on. 
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What is needed?  In my opinion it is the complete “death of politics,” as Karl Hess advocated over 45 years ago.  That is, greatly needed is a constitutional system that limits any and all governmental power.  There is just too much power to be had here, even by electoral means.  Checks and balances on all power are needed.  Extreme and radical limitations.  Decentralization of power, federalism, rule of law, strong independent courts that can check the tyranny of either majorities or elites.  As F.A. Hayek observed 70 years ago, when a political system allows great power to be had in the hands of any government – even an elected one such as the 1933 German one – it will be the gangsters, the wolves, who lust for and successfully take that power. 
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We are hunkered down in our home and will not venture too far out tomorrow.  But we are not worried about ourselves.  I have enough beer stocked up, we have enough water and food, and the cats’ food is ample.  Bangkok is a huge sprawled-out city, so the places where violence rages are usually safely spread out and far away, as we are on the outer fringes.  But we would like to see peace someday. 
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-Zenwind.

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28 January 2014

Tropical Shock, Again and Again

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I just cannot get used to it.  Sweating profusely in swim trunks even on our ground floor, our coolest area, I turn the fan on me as I open a cold beer from the frig.  The humidity is back to its normal uncomfortable levels.  The huge shock is when I look at the wall calendar which tells me it is January!  January back in the northern USA was hard frost!  This is so hard to conceive.  If this is our winter, what will the hot season be like?  My computer is over-hot and making alarming noises.  I'm dripping wet.
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I think that the few nights of sleeping without a fan blowing on me are over, as our brief record cold snap was too good to be true.  We sweat away the day from mid-morning through night, with a brief semi-tolerable temperature in the morning. As we have no hot-water heater for our plumbing, waking up is a harsh cold shower.  I realize that hot and cold are relative concepts, but as one transplanted from the north of North America I will always experience the Tropic heat as profoundly alien.  Whew!
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-Zenwind.
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24 January 2014

In the Cold Grip of Winter

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This week has seen the coldest temperatures that Bangkok has experienced in 30 years, experiencing a shocking low of 60*F!  I have actually slept without a fan blowing on me for the last several nights.
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I fear a new Ice Age is coming.
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-Zenwind.
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22 January 2014

January Note

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The Thai caretaker government has issued an Emergency Decree for 60 days. We are not affected too much. Mainly traffic gridlock due to the protests.
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My computer is making death rattles again, after a spell of smooth running during the early part of this Cool Season, so I am back to typing this on my phone. I have been advised to replace the computer rather than repair it. I am not sure what to do. I need a decent keyboard.
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-Zenwind.
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17 January 2014

Violence in Bangkok

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I’m sure that we all knew it was coming.  The anti-government protesters have had their “Bangkok Shutdown” marches all week and have been generally peaceful.  But nights have begun to be dangerous in some areas of the city, with several incidents of protesters being shot near their rally points and bombs thrown at the homes of prominent anti-government figures. 
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But today a bomb/grenade was thrown into the midst of anti-government protest marchers during broad daylight, sending dozens to hospital.  If history gives us instructive lessons, this will get much worse.  Tensions are building.
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The caretaker PM Yinglick (little sister of convicted fugitive Thaksin) and her caretaker government are being cornered by a number of corruption investigations by the courts that look to be quite sound, and their power base, the rural rice farmers whose numerous votes they’ve ‘bought’ by economically unsound populist policies (e.g., the insane guaranteed “rice-pledging” scheme), are angry and up in arms because their unreasonably expected goodies have not been -- and can never be -- delivered as promised.  It will get uglier.  This is Thailand. 
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We try to stay out of major trouble here on the city’s outskirts. 
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-Zenwind.

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15 January 2014

Artist’s Show at Warren Library

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My brother-in-law, Dan Clement, has a one-man exhibition of his artwork featured at the Warren (PA) Public Library’s Wetmore Gallery through January 31.  I wish I were in the States to see it.  Go see it if you can.  Dan’s website is HERE.

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-Zenwind. 
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13 January 2014

Bangkok Shutdown

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I don’t know where this massive anti-government protest is headed, because I’ll never understand many things about Thailand.  A loudspeaker started playing music and speeches at 07:00 today right outside on the street below our windows, and by 08:00 a modest crowd had gathered before marching off to block intersections in the city proper.  Again, they were middle-class folks, and it was a festive atmosphere. 
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The key thing in common that draws tens upon tens of thousands of Thais into the streets is an absolute loathing of Thaksin, the convicted former PM, and the culture of corruption that he represents.  For sure, Thai politics has always been massively corrupt – and uprooting this tradition will take generations – but Thaksin was the brazen master of it. 
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It is more complicated than that, but save it for another time. 
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I created a Twitter account, @Northwindhermit, a while ago at the beginning of this round of political upheaval – mainly to get up-to-date news flashes of transportation jams, potentially violent places to avoid, etc. Twitter throws a lot of junk at you, mainly vanity postings, but it is a novel form of speedy connection. 
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Today’s Twitter feed is almost impossible to keep up with.  News of key intersections being blocked has radically restricted traffic into the city.  The boats, subway, and elevated rail are crowded.  Many people cannot get in to work.  Some folks suggest just saying to hell with it and go to the beach. 
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-Zenwind.

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08 January 2014

Where Did Our Cool Season Go?

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Perhaps to North America?
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I know that at times I’ve teased my temperate zone friends and family about how warm and comfortable it is here while they are freezing up in the Great White North – and I realize they are at this moment suffering a full winter blast at well below 0*F (-18*C) and worse – but the heat and humidity here right now is dreadful, and it’s not funny!  This is supposed to be our one comfortable time of year.
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Today has been 95*F with increasingly humid air coming in.  At sundown it was too humid to be outside, as I was dripping with sweat after sitting out for five minutes, with mosquitoes having a feeding frenzy on my mostly bare body.  Now I’m inside treating my wounds. 
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In the Northern latitudes they are sitting close to the fireplace or heaters; here we huddle in front of fans.  Everyone longs for that perfect zone of comfort. 
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-Zenwind.

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01 January 2014

Book Reviews

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I've been cleaning up some of my draft files of philosophy book reviews and posted them on my main Zenwind site, linked above. Starting the New Year right!
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-Zenwind.
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