Brain Canvas

It was a Tuesday afternoon when they sealed the borders of the campus. Confusion spread around the place as students and faculty found they could not leave.  Shortly after the police and paramilitary trucks rolled into place to block access, the president of the university administration was heard on all the loudspeakers on campus, calling for all students to go to their dorms and all faculty to their offices; if they live off-campus, then they should stay in their classrooms, he clarified. Twenty minutes later, as the sound of helicopters whisked the air with a steady chopping beat, uniformed teams of administration lackeys strode into the gathering rooms of the old campus.  They carried with them large black bags and cases.  They all wore hard plastic face masks and body armor, giving them the appearance of riot police.  Each team carried a portable radio, which they turned on loudly while they called for the increasingly nervous population to sit down and shut up.  The voice of the president quacked to life: “You are now a part of a vital experiment, in which you must participate at pain of legal action or bodily harm against your person.  These people in black are referees.  You must obey them and you may not harm them.  They are carrying your equipment for the experiment.  The campus has been cordoned off into two base halves, and you are now on a team by virtue of which building you happen to be in right now.  The referees will give you armor with pressure sensation and GPS tracking, and everyone will receive a paintball gun.  West campus is the Red Team, East campus is the Blue Team.  After everyone is issued equipment, the doors will open.  Your team must capture the other team’s beacon and bring it safely back to your citadel, a location which the referees will reveal when they produce each team’s flag.  When you are shot, depending on where you are hit, you will either have to receive in-simulation medical care or you will be out of the simulation and your gun will stop working.  If  you are out of the simulation due to your wounds, there will be a nightly airlift to take the disabled to a holding facility where you will stay until the simulation ends.  The campus will only be unsealed when one team has captured the other’s beacon and returned it to their own citadel, and I personally verify that they have won.  Each side of the campus has one dining hall currently in their possession, which is stocked with enough food to support the needs of half the campus population for seven days.  Enjoy the paintball war.” His voice did not rise or fall, nor were there any hesitations or errant utterances, while he delivered this most unexpected address. Read the rest of this entry »

When I read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn in high school, apart from it being the “first great American novel” and all of the allegories and strong symbolism built up within the book, to me the most intriguing part was: they traveled down hundreds of miles of river in a raft and saw cool stuff and got into misadventures! Would that I could do what they did on the Mississippi River.  Back in the 1800′s that kind of a trip was possible, albeit dangerous.  Today though, major rivers are dammed up and diverted, preventing a great expedition from taking place. Let us pretend for a moment, though, that this was not so; that every major river on the Earth was not dammed up.  Disbelief must be suspended because the changes wrought by river engineering have been vast and widespread; here I am assuming that the topography of all places is the same, save for the removal of man-made river barriers. In this maritime alternative, you can build your own raft – mine would have a tiny cabin, a captain’s chair, and an ironic flag hoisted up – and travel on the cheap without having to do way too much work.  Start at the first navigable point past the headwaters in the middle of Spring and you will be rushed down the hydro-road to destinations that bring back to mind the fabulous journeys of the old Silk Road trading routes.  The river itself would lend context to every location you could visit.  Take the Danube from picturesque Regensburg, Bavaria, and on your way to the magnificent Black Sea you will pass through thousands of miles and years of varied history.  Vienna, Bratislava, Budapest, Mohács, a bit of Croatia, tons of Romania, some of Bulgaria, Serbia, and the Ukraine.  Why stop at the mouth when you could continue along the coast to Odessa, to Georgia and the Caucasian part of Russia, or to the whole northern coast of Turkey? Take also the Yellow River in China, home to the oldest continuous civilization on the planet.  The Yellow River would take you from grand mountains and canyons to the fertile plains which cradled early Chinese civilization, and which still holds a legendary place in the national psyche.  The Brahmaputra flows for a great length through the Tibetan plateau, then through Bangladesh and it empties along with the Ganges in a great river delta.  The Amazon? The Thames? The Rhine? The Nile? And of course, the modern-day Mississippi? The greatest part of the adventure, though, would come from what would inevitably arise from a resurgence in river traffic.  The riverbanks of towns and cities would once again become the lively centers of commerce and activity they once were.  An amazing array of goods could be purchased.  Many cultures would be found, and of course the docks would be the doorstep to swashbuckling adventure.  You should be able to find docking for your raft… it would be a lot less of a hassle than trying to find a parking space.  Meet up with other river-wanderers.  Find work, illicit or not, on a bigger boat or in some dockside bar. Give me three months and a raft, and I will be content.  For three months.

A fantasy: I walk into a bar with a friend or two in a city of historical importance, let’s say Washington, DC.  It does not matter whether it is a sharp and ultra-modern bar or a homey, well-worn public house.  We sit down on the stools at the bar, and before we can order our drinks a throaty, erudite voice to my left utters: “Are you gentlemen Tories, or Americans?” I turn to see who has asked this misplaced question to find Benjamin Franklin, complete with bifocals, period dress, and bald head giving way to a flowing ring of whitening hair.  His exceedingly ample frame overflows his barstool, but he appears at ease, not shoved against the bar, drinking a foamy amber ale from a pint glass.  “Excuse me?” my friend to the right asks. “I ask you again, friends, are you loyal to the tyrant King George the Third, or are you of an American persuasion?” We are certainly amused to temporary dumbness at the situation.  We walked in expecting a routine evening of socializing with each other and perhaps some other marginally interesting attendants of the pub.  Instead we have found someone well beyond the margins of interesting – quite a weirdo.  Curious and wanting to play along, I speak to him as if I was talking about my opinion on an upcoming, heavily contested Presidential election.  “American, of course! I don’t associate with anyone else.  Right, friends?” One friend nods vigorously in agreement, the other stares with brows raised, too cool to be a part of the game. “Well, you have found yourself in good company, sirs!” he assures us with a warmer tone.  “Publican! Three pints of your finest cask ale for these gentlemen, on my behalf.”  The bartender opens the tap on a large wooden barrel, letting forth a heady draught of the same color that Benjamin is enjoying.  He raises his pint glass and looks us each in the eye over the top rim of his bifocals, and once we follow suit with our glasses he declares, “That the nascent shoot of democracy and independence would be a sturdy, leafy oak for our grandchildren!” We reply “hear, hear” and take a swig.  It is thicker than what I am used to. He smacks his lips a bit and clears his throat lightly, saying “Every time I raise the glass to my lips, I remember why I come here.”  He puts his glass down and says “Friends, I do not have to tell you that we are at a crucial point in the progress of our American culture and political situation.  A great many of us have become used to the advantages the British take of us.  We are taxed without proper representation in the affairs of our overlords.  They monopolize how we communicate with one another.  They take too high a portion of the things we produce for themselves, after we have had to pay them already for the resources necessary to make an honest living.  And yet, due to the pressure they exert upon the psyche of we colonists, too many of us believe it is a just price to pay to say we are a people under the Crown.  Too many of us – yea, especially too many of us who hold sway over the opinions of our neighbor and the respect of our community – too many of us find it difficult or even seditious and sinful to question whether the Crown has wronged us.  They say, ‘How can the Crown wrong us? What comes from the King is the just law of the land.’” He takes another deep swig and as he does, none of us make even a twitch of the mouth or a move of our shoulders to suggest that we will interrupt what is clearly a momentary intermission in a feature-length dialogue.  After wiping his lips with his cuffs, Benjamin Franklin resumes: “This is why I fear for the opportunities that are offered by the potential of our thirteen Colonies.  If we humble and intent Colonists bind together as one union of American people, and cause our justly derived government to seat its power upon our sober and considered consent, we may take proper control over our destinies and not become slaves to a power in which we have no stake.  It is this realization which has driven me from complacency into a serious and active interest in the securing and advancement of independence for our Colonies.  Though they may call us terrorists or anti-commerce, I say we are nation-builders!  We cannot, as men who would say we are Americans in these troubled times, sit idly by and allow the tyrant’s oppression to grow and choke our emerging national character.” We all sat in silence as he downed the rest of his ale, gave the bartender a smile and a wave, and walked out the door of the bar.

Asian restaurants in the West generally try to put forth some effort into projecting an “Asian” image for patrons.  This can range from simply having some nice naturalistic paintings titled in Chinese / Japanese / Korean characters or a smiling Buddha at the cash register covered in pennies and with a dull spot where everyone’s fingers rub its belly, to elaborate fountains full of koi and Japanese rock gardens.

Here is one concept for a particularly pleasing and aesthetically complete setting, which I call the Sushi Boat.

The Sushi Boat is a small, wooden floating platform rather than a transport boat with an engine.  Its gunwales are carved with spare but gilt and well-defined katakana characters, describing the pleasure of dining on this boat and wishing its passengers a pleasant meal.  Square in shape, the center of the boat is occupied by a master sushi chef who works guarded and enclosed by the serving bar which rises about a meter off the platform where there is room enough for four diners, one at each side of the bar.  The chef’s station is sunk into the boat so that while he stands working, he is at eye level with the patrons who sit cross-legged or with their legs under them on comfortable pillows.  The deck of the boat itself is made of soft bamboo matting and shoes are left on shore.  All of the paneling on the inside and outside walls of the boat is a clean white.  The only local source of light is from candles set inside small Japanese lantern-style fixtures on the sushi bar.

Remarkable as well is the setting of this boat. It is not some grimy tourist attraction anchored along with similar craft against a concrete seawall.  Rather, it floats in a pristine and glassy-smooth lake fed by a mountain stream whose quiet flow provides aural ambiance.  The lake itself, perhaps a square mile in surface area, is surrounded on all sides by jagged cliffs and mountains, low enough to be green save for a few snowy peaks visible beyond the immediate perimeter.  The boat is accessed at its mooring, a small flat grassy beach where the vessel’s occupants leave their shoes and worldly cares.  At sunset, the boat floats off to wander with the lazy ripples and occasional currents coaxed by the mountain winds, its small crew aboard to enjoy a fine sushi dinner and sake.  As the chef heats up the sake and prepares the fresh rolls and nigiri, he chats with the diners.  Sometimes there are only two who have boarded the boat for a romantic date, other times a group of three or four who have heard of the legend of the sushi boat and seek an incredible meal and experience.  As they share tea and sake and anticipate the night’s offering of delicious fish and rice, the purple glow of the evening sky gives way to a starry black canopy that shines and sparkles brilliantly.  Free of external light pollution save the low soft glow of the candles in their paper chambers, the astral dots can be appreciated as they deserve.

To dine on the sushi boat is to dine in nature’s heaven.

- Inspired by K. Greenawalt