Help yourself to my "s'more goes blog"! You'll find trackeds and endtrials through S/SE Asia, my Pan-American overland wanderings, SoCal, and always bridges to and through the Middle Kingdom. Expect only occasional updates now from Jets, Journal, Wonder and environs.
December 30, 2005Stories From "The City of Eternal Spring"
Hoping We Type the Characters Correctly on This Spanish Keyboard in Cuernavaca, Morelos, Mexico ¡Hola compañeros de web! It's glorious to be back in the city where I spent two months studying Spanish in the summer of 2001. The rose vendors are still plentiful. The albino security guard with myopia to scare a mole still guards the same jewelry store. Solovina, the 18 year old perra de la calle still lives with mi Mama Mexicana. Susan and I went to visit her yesterday and reconfirmed that she is the sweetest lady on Miguel Salinas Street. The little old lady at the bottom of the street still runs a little lavandaria. My clothes haven't been this clean in weeks. Perhaps because it's holiday season and all the ricos from el Distrito Federal are in town, but the the number of cars on the street is asphyxiating. This morning I wrote and updated the site while Susan was out sketching. She got a commission yesterday. Last night We went to see lucha libre, Mexico's version of professional wrestling. More on that later. I've used all my flickr upload capacity for the month. I took lot of pics. In the afternoon I met a Swiss man who goes by the name of Stone who has worked with locals on organic farming and beekeeping for ten years. He saw the "don't panic, buy organic" sticker on my laptop and we hit it off immediately. After that, I went to the Cathedral of Cuernavaca I had some clothes to donate and didn't know where else to take them. Yesterday one of those nice old melt your heart church ladies said I would be more than welcome to donate the clothes there and they'd go to the poor. Today, there was only Father Pepe waiting in the old church, which in Pre-Columbian times was a pyramid until the Spanish trashed it and built a church out of the rubble. That gout-ridden puss bag conquistador Cortez built his palace within view. The murals inside the cathedral are of smiling whities piercing the sides of crucified fools, also smiling. Padre Pepe, the exceptionally caring proprietor of the place, was also smiling and I felt I could be honest with him. According to William S. Burroughs, you're not supposed to trust "a religious son of a bitch" with only matters of money, and since I had none, I just let the mouth rip through the erres. He pulled out a little Virgin Mary amulet and gave it to me. The priest wanted to know about my family, about what I had studied, about my wife. He was holding my hand the whole time. "I don't have a wife." "Why not?" I swallowed. "Because I'm gay." He kept smiling and simply said, "your sexual preference is simply that, and I can respect that. God only asks that you take responsibility for it. You should not have to have sex to be happy." I agreed and let my hand drop, saying that the Buddha would say the same. Cut out desire and you cut out suffering. "What religion are you?" I answered that I was simply spiritual, but had studied the teachings of Jesus and the Buddha and found them quite compatible. And that the language of God was the only thing that really got people upset because there's no way people could be talking about different things when they imagine the Ultimate. People are always thinking and speaking different things--all wrong, of course--but they're good enough for me. "But you do not have the god that we provide," he started to say, reaching for my hand again. "I have the Ultimate in my heart," I answered. "So do I." "Yeah, the ultimate is all around us. In this desk--" "--all over the earth." "Jesus came to earth with the keys to heaven. And here we are. They fit in my heart." "Mine too," he said, again taking my hand. It was getting late. He wished me pleasant and safe travels. Then he offered to administer to me the final mass of the year, which is tomorrow. I declined. I'm really not into his product. And yet I remain curious. Perhaps I'll wander over there tomorrow, if I don't have anything better to do than drink a pretty silly appoximation of the blood of Christ. Working Out the Bugs
Thanks for Bearing With Us Having complete control over the contents of this blog (server-side and content) means there's lots of room for me to insert the wrong characters in the wrong places and thus render the blog unreadable. This was the case for the past four days and that's why the blog wasn't refreshing. I've also added google ads as a way to 1) pay for bandwidth and server space so I can begin podcasting with abandon 2) see how well the machine knows me. It's always interesting to see how helpful google ads can be. December 28, 2005Two Days in a Bus
And Now We're In Cuernavaca, Morelos Add one flu-stricken Susan and one tired Joshua to Tijuana and what do you get? A two-night trip across Mexico. And now we're in Cuernavaca, Morelos, just south of Mexico city with just enough daylight to find a cheap hotel room. More later. Here's a map with Cuernavaca highlighted. December 25, 2005More from Susan's Sketchbook
Carefully uploaded for your viewing pleasure Carlsbad, CA    From the top: These are Laura's pet finches, Pepper and Spice. They live in a cage next to the Christmas tree. The sleeping dog is Patsy. We've known one another for 15 years now. The non-pet with the Guitar is Julie Lieu, a masseus, Mary Kay rep, and music student. She gave us a ride from Sunnyvale to San Luis. You may remember her from such previous posts as "The Best Fake Meat By Far: Vietnamese Vegetarian Hearty Enough to Satisfy Even Carnivorous Cravings" Big News
New Server for A Backpack and a Keyboard Carlsbad, California The page is a little basic right now, but over the next few weeks I'll be making it snazzy. Tomorrow Susan and I leave for Mexico. December 24, 2005 China's Homophobic Policemen:Why Won't they Leave the Gay Boys Alone? reports from the inside Though I left China four months ago, I keep up fairly regular communication with the gay community there. So it was disturbing to learn that China's police in the past few days have been making efforts to stop gay people from organizing China's first gay cultural festival in Beijing. Reuters writes: The event was originally booked to take place at the "798 Factory" art colony in the Dashanzi area of Beijing. But on Wednesday, December 14, two days before the opening, the Beijing Public Security Bureau banned the organizers from using the "798 Factory" area. The organizing committee, some of whose members reported police surveillance, decided to move the festival to a private establishment, the On/Off bar. About 3 p.m. on Friday, just before the start of activities, around a dozen uniformed police, accompanied by plainclothesmen, raided the bar and shut down the event.In Shanghai last night, police officers disrupted activities in the city's newest gay bar. They were seen harassing dancing patrons. As with Stonewall in the 1960s, the patrons harassed them back. As far as I know from my sources, no one threw any high heels. Why can't the Chinese police leave gay people alone? My opinion is that most of the men in uniform are excited about being in gay bars. Following orders? Perhaps. But who issues the orders? Some sad man with internalized homophobia or the fear that his son is gay. Homosexuality is evolution's solution to overpopulation. To deny that sexuality is to allow the dominanating hetero-normative worldview free reign--dominion--over the earth. That's wrong. This is not the way to construct, as Jiang Zemin said, "a well-off society in an all-round way with Chinese socialist characteristics." Here's a Chinese person who knows the way. Come on boys in uniform. Come out, come out, wherever you are! We don't have time for your shenanigans, unless you're going to dance! December 21, 2005Two Painters and a Meditator
Or, Two Hours of Bliss in San Luis Obispo, CA  Yesterday Susan and her "first bohemian influence," Ken Christensen, painted me in the back yard of Ken's house. After a few minutes of wicked winds, the weather cooperated. I settled into a meditation against the backdrop of Ken's tapes: Robert Plant, White Stripes, Van Morrison. It wasn't really meditation in the Thai Buddhist monastery sense. With the music in the background, my consciousness had more distractions. Two hours flew by like nothing.So what about Ken, our host of now four/five days? He paints for a living. He has a wife Paca from Spain who teaches high school Spanish. She helps me sew and refamiliarize myself with the Spanish tongue. He has two beautiful daughters. He writes books that you might enjoy.  When Susan was five years old, Ken moved in across the street from her in Petoskey, Michigan. Before her mother knew Susan had even left the house, Susan had barged in Ken's front door and introduced herself. When her mother finally found her, Susan was helping Ken and Paca sort their silverware. As Ken pointed out, the fact that he had silverware at that time kindof nullified the idea that he was a Bohemian. Ken now makes his living in the town of San Luis Obispo, a few hours north of LA, ten minutes from the Pacific Ocean.I interviewed him and this will be part of an upcoming podcast. Check back at a future date.  Here's a picture of the sunset while we walked the dog last night. What is Susan doing? First one to guess correctly gets something special.
December 20, 2005Address in Venezuela
If you send letters now, Susan and I will probably be able to get them at this address: Carlos Krisch Carretera Transandina s/n Sector La Choza, El Pedregal Tabay, Edo. Merida Venezuela We'll probably be there sometime in late January at the earliest. What Happened Today
In Prose Poem Form San Luis Obispo  Two in the AfternoonTwo painters up the road and my two cheeks on these sharp rocks under two bridges. Two kids noisy on the rope bridge. Two axles parked by the second, a third kid passing over two channels, yelling at his friends to be quiet before asking me "Hey are you trying to write a poem?" Moments Broken Plop! Rocks by fish and me. Barrage from above! So out my hiding place fr'under the bridge. Boys with bowl cuts and sling shots! Rocks flying my way until I take higher ground. Are you a Scientist? I am, little boy, if waiting by a creek until you stop shooting rocks makes me so. To not get angry, but just observe your actions. My satisfaction is with the gurgling brook and the meadow lark and the sound of your artillery. You scare the fish, but the fish come back. I know you'll go away.  The Best Fake Meat By Far: Vietnamese Vegetarian Hearty Enough to Satisfy Even Carnivorous CravingsSan Jose, California link to flickr pictures tagged "vietnamese" my superglu web integration page  Craig's list never ceases to amaze me. I find a Trager practitioner. (Caution, link is in Italian). Then Susandeye find a ride to pick us up in Sunnyvale. She's a college student and we stop at her lovely 59 year old Vietnamese mother's house because she's going with us to California Poly-tech in San Luis Obispo.  The crying Virgin Mary statue reared her crying head again, this time with Vietnamese subtitles. We agree to go to their favorite vegetarian restaurant on the way in San Jose.In the restaurant there was a Vietnamese version of Guanyin. We ate vegetarian Pho, Vietnam's national dish, a rice noodle soup made with beef broth. Check out pics of the fake beef, some of the fake fried chicken, sinews and all. Here's dessert. Restaurant name: Tofoo Com Chay: Vegetarian Deli and Sandwiches The street address: 388 this pictures contains it The street name: Santa Clara this picture contains it Go to this restaurant if you value your taste buds, your wallet, and the lives of things with faces. December 15, 2005Karaoke, Yellow Fever, and Golden Gate Park
We've got our shots. San Francisco, CA por Susana       The first thing we did upon arriving in San Francisco with Jon and Nicole was to head out to Encore Karaoke Bar (1550 California at Polk) owned by old friends Chris and Mark, the couple who shared their home with us for the next couple days. The favorites of the evening? "Hot Blooded" by Foreigner, "Clementine" and dozens of Christmas songs sung by the staff in the wee hours after the clientele had dwindled off. Next, we returned to the house, conveniently located at the center of town, near the panhandle of Golden Gate Park, and played music until it was time for Josh and me to set off at sunrise to wait in line at Adult Immunization Clinic of the San Francisco Department of Public Health. (Highly recommended! They don't charge for office visits and their vaccines are reasonably priced. Just get there early if you don't have an appointment.) There, after a much shorter wait than we had been prepared for, we had a delightful two hours with our lovely nurse. We got the lowdown on all the major afflictions of the South American continent in addition to our Yellow Fever, Hepatitis and Typhoid injections. Next, we ventured to Berkeley so Josh could interview Associate Professor of East Asian Languages and Literature, Andrew Jones. He, Josh, and Miliou, his Welsh Terrier spent the afternoon listening to and discussing Pre-revolutionary Chinese recorded song. Check back on our podcast page at a later date for this recording. December 14, 2005 Fresh from the Sketchbook
The latest colored pencil and watercolor Photographed in Sacramento  Here's a portrait of the aforementioned Jon.  Wallace and the Violin December 13, 2005Guess Who's Bleeding from the Eyes!
The Adventure Continues In Sac-town, CA  After four days of livin' it up in Portland, we took a relaxing Greyhound ride to beautiful and Ann Arbor-esque Eugene, Oregon, where we holed up for a few days to recover.We boarded another Amtrak train, this time riding it to Sacramento. Josh's highschool buddy Jon picked us up from the train station. We have been staying with him and his wife Nicole (and their cat Wallace).  Our first full day in Sacramento, Jon took us to see a statue of the Virgin Mary at the Vietnamese Martyrs Catholic Church that had inexplicably begun to cry blood two weeks earlier. It was a sunny day, and the statue was surrounded with a wall of flowers and candles. According to Jon (who'd gone a week earlier to see it) the crowds and intensity had diminished. The parking lot in front of the statue was full of folding chairs. We sat for a few moments in the viewing area. The wonder of the thing was not the fluid seepage from the statue's eyes, but the intensity of calm faith the people embodied as they came to experience the "miracle". Over the wafting flower scents and blaring of a loudspeaker in Vietnamese, people thumbed rosaries and prayed in a variety of languages.On our way back from the periphery of the obscene Sacramento exurbs, we stopped at Safetyville, USA.    Now, I'm not entirely sure, but from what we gathered, this little universe was created as a place where kids can skateboard without the ever-present threat of getting hit by automobiles. The town is complete with storefronts of banks, McDonald's, a Church (though it was roped off with caution tape because of the broken stained glass), crosswalks, traffic lights, and advertisements--all in miniature--and enclosed by a chainlink fence topped with barbed wire. We were enjoying ourselves immensely until a gentleman in a mullet with a Big Gulp stormed out of the capitol building and politely informed us that it was a private party, and we would have to leave. For the remainder of our time in Sacramento, we have been attending to our plebeian needs--procuring food, and sewing thick plastic and mosquito netting together to rig a super-hammock for whatever the jungle has in store...
December 06, 2005Look at all the Couch Surfers
Info on an Interesting Project We Discovered While In Eugene, Oregon  Scott Trudeau forwarded me this site, which connects people who want to offer up free couch space to people like this who happen to be passing through. It's a non-profit organization, been around since 1999. sWEET! Here's my profile. Photos: Greensky Bluegrass
Plays Bell's Brewery Kalamazoo, MI  We heard these guys play just before jumping on the Empire Builder. Susan stepped in on fiddle for a few songs. My bro and I arrived too late to see her play, but we heard it from afar. Since we were "with the band," we got free mugs of that famous, delicious, intoximacating Bell's brew. The place was packed. View the flickr set here. Video coming soon. December 04, 2005Seth Bernard Plays the Alberta Street Public House
And the Crowd Sings Along Portland, Oregon This was a recording I made of Seth and friends at the Alberta Street Public House, an Irish pub in Northeast Portland, Oregon. Seth and his gal Daisy May were in town for two weeks. Daisy was sick that night, so Seth played lots of old solo songs that he doesn't get a chance to play by himself very often. He started with a short mic test so you can skip the first five minutes of this recording, or not. Just know that the words soon become distinguishable. His friend Brian Oberlin (a Portland resident) joined him on Mandolin, his sister Jen Bernard on backup vocals, and Susan Fawcett on harmonica. A man named David _____ played guitar in the last song. Be forewarned: this 32kbps .wav file is what it is: barely adequate. Download the recording: REC14.wav Visit Seth Bernard online at three doubleyoos Earth Work Music dot com December 03, 2005 Our Trip, From an Artist's HandFirst Glimpses at Susan's Sketchbook    Hey friends!This is an invitation to experience our journey in a very special way. We're making Susan's sketchbook completely open to public perusal and wonder. First sketches come from the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago. Here's a watercolor of me that Susan did while riding Amtrak's Empire Builder through Montana. While we won't be posting every picture to A Backpack and a Keyboard, I did create a flickr set (Susan's Sketchbook). We'll upload new pages about once a week as time and connectivity permit. Enjoy! View Susan's Sketchbook December 02, 2005 Decent Shanghai Daily Writeup on Shanghai Gay Outreach EffortsThe Shanghai Daily, always a few beats ahead of the China Daily, but never one for Pulitzer-winning material, writes a nice feature about a topic and people dear to my heart. (note, click here to view the story, because the link on the right takes you to my flickr page).  Yesterday Was World AIDS DayIt was also the Day Without Art The framed piece to the right is something I made in March of 2002,. It illustrates the number of daily HIV/AIDS deaths in relation to the number of people who died in the WTC attacks. I'd have taken a better pic, but this is screwed to the wall in Arbor Vitae, my old loft, and I had to take this picture by hanging off a staircase. Maybe next time I'm in Ann Arbor I can stand on a ladder and take a better pic. Click on the image for more detailed views. December 01, 2005Mold Everywhere
a brief update from Portland, Oregon The 46 hour train ride from Chicago to Portland went with hitch, except for a hangup when a freight train occupied our track. Our fellow passengers were varied and friendly. I hope someday to ride the "Empire Builder" in the opposite direction and see all the scenery during the daytime that we passed at night this time. I'm trying to solder the antenna onto my wireless internet card. It's an internal card for a Compaq Presario 2100 and the computer has a built-in antenna. Once that succeeds (perhaps with a bit of prefessional help) I'll get the backlog of media uploaded. Archives
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