Life is a strange strange thing and it’s hard to sometimes stay rooted in place and believe that all of this, and you, and me, are anything more than figments of a grander imagination. Of my imagination. I once tripped acid beneath an ancient oak tree on a small mountain in California. At times, it […]
Tales of This and That
In the heat of the night
Summer is a weird one. it’s hard to imagine working on anything tedious during these long hot months. Most likely due to the years of summer vacation I enjoyed as a boy. Summer is a space outside of time. The days are too long, the nights to short, and each day is a quest to […]
The Sliver of a Moon
A waxing crescent above Lake of the Isles and the sky drifts towards darkness, crimson pink purple and orange on one side, the first stars in the blackening blue on the other. There are not enough breaths in the human day to take it all in, and even when I do, I’m still not sure […]
It’s April Again
Today I smoked a joint and walked around the Gulou area, and thought about many things. People everywhere, great clumps of pollen swirling in a funnel right above my head. Bright sunlight through the little olive leaves onto my face. I thought of my old professor, Moses. He lives in Beijing and so far has […]
Chongqing’s Cheating Heart
Ok now I am going to get into some hater shit. I watched an old Katt Williams special last night and he was talking about Star Players and Haters. This essay is actually an older one that’s been in my Stuff Folder for a while, but as I was cleaning up my desktop in preparation […]
Free
My boy heard me singing this at 6:30am as I prepared for work. He woke up and padded out and hung out by the door waiting for me to to call his name. I did and he came in and snuggled for a bit. I put the song on repeat and he fell asleep to it. […]
Caixin is awesome, but the sun is still gonna blow up someday
This article here, Urban Platforms in a Policy Pressure Cooker, is just one example of Caixin Online’s excellent reporting on China’s political and economic landscape. The high-quality English is also extraordinary, as most Chinese media almost never nail the news voice that, for better or for worse, dominates the international media’s idea of what is credible […]
Pragmatic above all things
I know a girl named Color who stopped me on the street one day and said, I am different from every other Chinese girl out there. I think deep, she said, and I question everything. Everybody thinks I am weird and I have few friends. I say strange stuff like, Why would you do that? […]
A many headed troll at the helm
Imagine a four-headed know it all troll with a broad streak of arrogance at the helm of the Gray Pearl in the midst of the Perfect Storm, the End of the Known World dropping off into Nothing on one side, the whirlpool that almost got Ulysses on the other. If you were a hand on […]
Imprisoned
Liao Yiwu is a Chengdu native and he recently escaped over to Berlin via the Horse and Tea Trade Route pathways of southern China. Reading his story today reminded me of a few things. Ever since I have lived in China, I imagined my escape route. There are a few, but the Yunnan-Guangxi one is […]
Many faces
I went to Carrefour aka Roundabout aka 家乐福 to buy a razor and shaving cream and it took me almost an hour. Carrefour is a five minute walk from my house, but they hide the entrance inside a labyrinth of shops and alleys and lanes. Unless you know that KFC is always located near the main […]
Up for Grabs
I spent a full year under the harsh lights of Ctrip’s corporate glare and I wrote a lot of stuff for them. It seemed like pissing into the wind, for the most part. I met great people there, but the Chinatravel.net site for which I worked is the mortally wounded man doggedly clinging to life, […]
Recent news and other tidbits
Once again, i have neglected my own personal blog in favor of other “cooler” spots that either pay me or raise my exposure level up a micron. Unfortunate, but a lot of it has to do with fatigue and time. With two sons (pic post coming up later, don’t worry) a brother truly has no […]
Fast, Cheap or Good: You can only have Two
Rumor has it that Tom Waits once said this to Jim Jarmusch over whiskey and pop tarts, but it could have been Ben Franklin. I find it to be a pretty decent appraisal of what is possible in today’s world. In the US, I believe people chose “fast and good” whereas in China people chose […]
Into a groove
When it comes to blogging and just writing in general, its important to get your groove on. For a while there I was writing wak destination guides using bad reviews from the web and memories — either mine or some one elses. That actually hasn’t changed. part of my job is still exactly that: armchair […]
I should be armchair travelin’
but i’m surfin instead. The other day my man Charlie got the China Blues, you know, when it dawns on you that all of the things that you heard about China as a kid actually don’t exist anymore and have been replaced by “ignorant drones on autopilot” … happens to all of us here. I […]
My wrist hurts
And when I was in Chengdu a few weeks a go I told my shifu Li Cuan about it and he made me pound on the iron circle for a while. it felt better afterwards. i am back at the 9-5 grind after a few weeks on the road filming stuff for the China Travel […]
Horse & Tea Trade Route
I’ve been up and down this road and written a few things about it — the road that links India and Southeast Asia with southwest China and Tibet. Here are links to the stories I have written and also a lil slideshow to boot: Yunnan, yonis, Sichuan & ponies Shaxi Town The Horse and Tea […]
One Second Encounters
I can only remember a few, but my mind swims with them in the hours before i rise and after the alarm has already been silenced. I remember the little Chinese meimei sitting with her grandmother on a bench in Chengdu, on Renmin Road South. I was walking along with Heather from Proximity Butterfly. Heather […]
New ish has come to Light
If you have not noticed, I have a few Fiction tales up. I won’t be posting a bunch of tales there, just a couple to whet peoples’ appetites. The latest one is called, “The Imam who Sang” and I like it. Check it out. I also just recently updated Nonfiction to reflect some work i […]
i am that i am
reading foucalt’s pendulum has been a three month odyssey through umberto eco’s dream library. i finally fell into the pace of the book, now, near the end. and everywhere i see lorenza, belbo — i am belbo, no i am aglie … the man with the scar was on my flight to chengdu. he chatted […]