人生最難處理的是人際關係。越親越難。生疏的人，以禮儀相處，否則不理他就罷了。如何跟親人相處，是一門很難的學問。

可能也是因為自心不正，不敢直視本心，所以投射于日日相聚的人。

唐朝有一家九代同堂，早婚長壽故。因為千載難逢，唐太宗特地親自架臨。戶長由一位約六十歲的子嗣當的。皇上問，九代同堂，如何修身齊家？如何與九代相處？戶長不語，要了紙筆，寫了「忍」字百張。

九二八祭孔大典由馬市長主祭，President Bean缺席。去參加一下有甚麼關係嘛~~禮義廉恥是管仲講的，不是孔子。免驚。

從前住中橫的，不是山胞就是山東人，因為山東人忠信可靠，又不怕冷，所以這條重要幹道由他們守護。那時沿路很多小孩講話都是山東音。

我向來愛山，尤愛臺灣的山。大學時，冬天一有假就往山裡跑(夏天去浮潛)。經常到大禹嶺借住救國團招待所，去的時候通常只有我一個人住。負責招待所的陳世華先生看到我又爬上階梯來了，就不講話，掉頭往裡面走，拿幾個饅頭出來給我，說，你又來爬山了，再往裡面走，找東西給我吃。我沒記錯的話，民國六十一、二年，大禹嶺的人口是七。可是其它「村」的同鄉時常來串門子。

他們的生活很簡樸。有一次我跟陳先生要了一張名片。他思索了一回，慢慢從架子上拿了一條煙，把尾巴端的那片紙板小心撕下來了，在抽屜摸索找出一枝筆，在紙板上一筆一畫寫成他的名片。你大概沒注意過吧，一條煙盒尾端的那一片紙板，剛好也是名片的尺寸。

因為我趁假期去，所以常把課本帶在背包。山中讀古書，韻味尤佳。有一次課業是左傳；招待所只有我一個客人，我坐在通鋪榻榻米上靜靜地看，一個同鄉老兵(其實不老；中年人)看到問我，你在讀書嗎？
是。
讀甚麼書？
左傳。
讀到哪兒？
我就把我讀的那一句念出來了，沒想到，老兵接下來把那段念完──背誦的。我傻眼。怎麼那麼巧，剛好我念的這段他會背？他笑笑說，隨便翻開找一段念。好，我隨便翻，念了一句，他馬上接口繼續念下去。試了四五段，從隱到哀，一字不漏。

我目瞪口呆，左傳不容易懂，還有人背！他說他小時候十三經都背了，只是爾雅與周禮念比較不順。可惜學業未成，日本人發動戰爭，家破人亡，他只好投筆從戎。戰爭勝利，正想重飭學業，毛澤東搞局，他知道毛澤東手下的讀書人沒日子好過，就隨軍來臺灣。

講到此，他搖搖頭，站起來往廚房叫，老陳！咱們再喝一杯兒，俺就該回去了。他對我說，小老弟，俺不吵你了，你好好讀書吧。

從前，美加對面巷子裡開了一家素食自助餐，天喜，69塊吃到飽，菜色多，東西好吃，又便宜，氣氛佳，很多吃葷的人愛吃，一兩年生意好到把老闆累垮了，停止營業，實在可惜。生意太好，大家擠在一起盡情吃美味的菜，所以大家都很親切。常常兩個人的話題，即使不認識，全桌人都加入。
一個美加的學生常在天喜碰到，常聊天；他念法律，很優秀。有一次星期天模攷講解後下課，他女朋友來接他，剛好我在南陽街遇到他們。打了招呼，誇了男生幾句，因為確實是個人才。講完，他女友轉過去看他的崇拜眼神，讓我感受到，我當老師能這樣，也就夠了。

前幾天有人問我得過甚麼獎。想一想，這生我幾乎沒有拿過獎，只有高中畢業時拿了個甚麼歷史獎；畢業典禮舉行時我已經離開學校一萬多公里，所以沒有關係。問我有沒有得過甚麼教師獎之類的，我教書是為了錢不是為了獎。說真的，把我放在臺上拿獎，叫大家鼓掌，多尷尬。這樣講不是酸葡萄，是孤癖成性。我不喜歡熱鬧、大群場面。對我來講，學生進步是最好的獎。雖然這樣講很噁心。

Spinach all over the US has bee recalled due to some sort of contamination.

Oh no! What will Popeye do?

The worry has entered my peevish little mind that I haven't alienated my readers recently. Readers? Readers? This blog has readers? Well, let's suppose. Make believe.
Pause here while I consider the pros and cons of installing a hit counter on my blog… do I really want to know?
Ok, let's roll up our sleeves and get to work. I wish to state that wedding photos are silly and vapid. People don't look like their wedding photos, thank heavens, so what are they preserving memories of? A fantasy totally divorced from reality? (please remark my choice of words: intentional)

It would be better to find a friend with a camera and ask that friend to shoot pictures of the great day. No, that won't do, it's not enough of a hassle, and nobody is making money off of it. I suspect that many couples secretly pretend they are celebrities, movie stars being photographed for fancy magazines. That's why they hire a cameraman to get in everybody's way to film the event and make CDs nobody will ever watch. Nothing is more realistic than marriage, the day after day year after year joy and turmoil of accommodating another soul in your life. Fantasy does not seem a good way to kick it off.

But fantasy is lucrative. According to a study by the Fairchild Bridal Group, in 2005 the average American wedding cost US$26,327. That's average for the whole country, and then you consider that the divorce rate in the US is 50%. In this respect the US is better off than Argentina, where the divorce rate is 200%. But still, twenty-six thousand bucks is a lot for a party that has an even chance of ending with both participants spitefully setting fire to a big pile of glossy wedding photos and trampling on the ashes.

Consideration should be given to the suggestion by Ky Phong Tran, a Viet Kieu in Cali, that weddings be carried out privately on a small scale, and public feasts and celebrations be held only when the couple has proved their staying power, on an anniversary of the wedding.

Maybe when they've been through a couple years together, they'll have the sense and maturity not to dress up in those ridiculous outfits to strike preposterous poses for the camera.

Once I read an article about the hierarchy in science. The author said that the more removed a science is from our daily lives, the more prestigious it is. Physics, especially concerning the Big Bang, is at the top of the ladder; I still remember his well-turned phrase: "the important science of meteorology is beneath notice.”

This afternoon I was reading yet another paean of gushing enthusiasm for Einstein. All due respect to Einstein, who was a great genius, but was he the only genius? Was inventing the Xerox machine easier than discovering relativity? I don't think so, but please tell me the name of the man who invented the photocopier. Yes? See? Because a photocopier is something we can't do without, there's one in every office and convenience store, but relativity has almost no direct bearing on our everyday lives.

I do remember the guy who invented the photocopier lived in Pasadena. I think. California, anyway. Well, definitely the West Coast.

A story about Viet Nam
I wrote this in 1980.
_________
Ngo was about my age, born and raised in Hue.

When he was in grade school, he and a classmate were down by the bridge when they saw an anti-Diem demonstration. Tanks came, and his friend was shot dead by a tank. Ngo showed me the stone put up on the spot in commemoration.

He was a teenager in 1968, when Hue fell to the Viet Cong in the Tet Offensive. He saw the attempt by the VC to liquidate the intelligentsia, the opposition, and almost everybody else not rabidly communist. Walking around his hometown, he saw hands waving futilely from the earth, the hands of people trying feebly to claw a hole out of pits where so many of them had been buried alive.

I met Ngo in Quang Tri in 1974: six years after the assault, six years after the great massacre of Hue intellectuals, two years after the nearby massacre of thousands of peasants fleeing from communist aggression. We did not know it was the last summer of the Republic of Viet Nam. We were trying to rebuild a schoolhouse on a desolate patch of sand that had been a city before the 1972 invasion.

Ngo's philosophy of life he explained to me one night as we listened to the drumming of the North Viet Namese psychological warfare troops a kilometer away across the border:

"Prayers don't stop tanks.”

買東西，朋友問價錢的話，從他的反應可以看出很多。
有人，不管你說買多少錢，他一定說「太貴啦！」甚至「你被騙了」。有人就說「很便宜，你賺到了」。心態不同。你是屬于哪一種人？

講到此，想起美國一個故事。 Somebody bought a house in a development called Eaglewoods for $400,000. He really liked the house, but after he bought it, he was thinking maybe he had paid too much for it.

A few days later he went to a party, where he told one of his friends about the house, and was wondering if he had paid too much for it. His friend said, "There's my brother-in-law, he's in real estate, let's ask him," so they did. They asked the brother-in-law, "What do you think about the real estate in Eaglewoods?”

The brother-in-law said, "Eaglewoods? Great investment, you can't go wrong, because let me tell you, you can get a great return on your investment. Why, just the other day some stupid idiot paid $400,000 for a house there!”

男友也好，
女友也好，
不要怒友才好
吃飯時我前面坐著一對情侶，男的講甚麼，女生的反應一致，不是裝生氣臉就是出手假裝要打人。說可愛、撒嬌嘛，再看她眼神，其實這應該是她真正個性的表露。我很想跟男的說，十年二十年你要活在她脾氣的陰影下嗎？

幾年前看過托福班上一個男生，每次選錯答案，握拳輕輕地貼在女友臉上，我幾乎忍不住要當場叫女生趕快逃命。現在熱戀中他一點點挫折的處理法只有拳頭，現在拳頭輕，將來必定越來越重，這是可以保證的；這種人妳敢跟他住嗎？
(我怕講出來女生下課被修理，只好暗示一番，希望她聽董了。)

被配偶打的人失去信心，以為真的是自己不好，會幫對方想藉口，想要改變他。

打配偶是絕症，有一絕對有二有三有四數到死，別想改變他，自己先逃生要緊。
________
按：現在提倡男女平等的時代，有寫「他/她」，很礙瞻觀，我不喜歡這種寫法，可是虐待配偶不是男人的專利。要看誰的業障重。

listen to the cicadas, watch the mist

east and southeast
tring ngasan ku, Pinsknus, Uray

relax a bit, watch the mist, listen to the mountain.
ngasan ku, Pinsknus, Uray

我不了解時事，我有幾個問題想請大家幫我解釋一下，多謝多謝。

一、當年的口號是「換人作作看」。人換了，請問，六年來為國民作了些甚麼？看得出來嗎？
二、就任時，某人說，尹清風命案一定要嚴辦，絕對要察到水落石出，否則決不罷休；請問「水落」與「水扁」不一樣嗎？
三、字典上說，「挺」是直立的意思，「扁」是平薄的意思，請問，挺扁兩個字不是反義詞嗎？
四、秘密外交是甚麼？是不是秘密把錢送到外國交給銀行？
五、面對臺灣的問題，我們應該為全民的前途著想，或者為政黨集權著想？
六、臺灣的問題，我們是要改善、昇華，或者要情緒化、加深百姓的敵對？
七、為甚麼政府不再用「團結就是力量」這個口號？
八、三十年前，臺灣各各角落，常看到「炎黃子孫都是同胞」的標語，為甚麼現在看不到？
九、假如最近臺灣民眾的活動果真中了中共的計謀，假設最終目的是要顛覆中華民國政府，這不就證明幾十年前蔣中正、國民黨講對了嗎？
十、假設最近臺灣民眾的活動果真是中共的計謀，是不是表示臺灣民眾都是傻瓜，很容易上中共的當？如果是這樣的話，需不需要控制一下、預防陰謀得逞？如果是這樣的話，當年關黨外的人有甚麼不對？
十一、假設最近臺灣民眾的活動果真是中共的計謀，為甚麼那麼多人熱烈相應？是不是表示中共比民進黨更了解臺灣民眾的需求？
十二、你認為所有不如意的事都可以歸咎於中共？可不可能有些事情是執政者自己不完美？如果執政者是人，不是神，作事也會犯錯，他們一概把事情推的很乾淨，這是一種負責任的作風嗎？

I disdain profanity because it is so boring and unimaginative. A good sharp tongue can be much more vituperative than the foulest mouth. Thus Attorney General Edward Bates (under Lincoln) in 1863 wrote:
"When the public cauldron is heated into violent ebullition, it is sure to throw up from the bottom of society some of its dirtiest dregs, which, but for the heat and agitation, would have lain embedded in congenial filth in the lowest stratum of society.”
Not an obscenity to be seen, but infinitely more scathing than reciting the worn out words concerning excretion and fornication.
The problem is that to write like that, or read it, you have to think, something people today are singularly averse to.

How I helped my father quit smoking
My father was a man of simple pleasures. He'd come home from work, get a can of beer from the fridge, spread out the newspaper on the kitchen table, and Pete Talovich was as good as in heaven.

That was his total alcoholic intake. I can't vouch for when he was young and rowdy, but I never saw my father drunk, not even close to it. We had problems enough without.

No television in our home. We didn't want it, we didn't have time for it. After dinner Dad might go tinker on the car, work out some chess problems, trim the lawn, exchange putrid puns with me, or else get out a good book, sit in his chair, and spend the evening in deepest Africa or the torrid deserts of Australia where the temperature was so high the lead dropped out of the explorers' pencils. For Father's Day you didn't want to get Dad a tie, not if there was a new Alan Moorehead book out.

If Mr Moorehead had not produced any new works, you could get Dad pipe tobacco so he could huff and puff as Ur was unearthed. From time to time he would solemnly tell me, Tobacco is bad for you. We would gather his pipes and troop out to the garage. I held the pipes as Dad got out the anvil and the ball peen hammer, and one by one, reduced the pipes to powder. Very happily, Dad would stow the anvil and the hammer, and arise, a free man again.

Thereafter hippopotamus would capsize brave explorers' fragile boats with no pipe smoke in the air. For a month or two. Then Dad would come home with his hand in his suit pocket, and you knew what was up. "Look at this new pipe they've come up with, isn't this a beauty? They say it draws much better than the old models, so I thought I would take it for a spin.”

Not always pipes. Sometimes he would come home with a fistful of cigars; he was of a generation that considered cigarettes effeminate.

One evening, during a protracted cigar phase, Dad looked at his cigar, looked at me, and said, "I should quit smoking cigars. Tobacco is bad for you. But it's hard to quit.”

The fatal words had been spoken. It doesn't make sense to smash cigars on an anvil. I put my little mind to work, seeking a way to help Dad quit smoking cigars.

As it happened, it was at the end of the school year that he said those words to me. Soon the Glorious Fourth approached, with firework stands selling sky rockets and magic snakes and sparklers. And sparklers. Sparklers. A plan evolved.

I bought sparklers, as did every other kid in the nation. But I had something different in mind. Very carefully, when nobody was about, I approached the drawer in which Dad kept his cigars, each in its own cellophane wrapper. Stealthily, I silently opened the drawer and withdrew a cigar. I compared its length and girth to a sparkler. It looked like a fit. I surreptitiously closed the drawer again, and waited a few days until it happened that I was the only one home.

Again, I tiptoed to the cigar drawer and withdrew a cigar. With infinite patience, I meticulously opened one end of the cellophane wrapper and withdrew the cigar. I clipped the sparkler down so it was only about two thirds the length of the cigar. If I had taken such care in Shop, I'd have been a master craftsman long since. With great care, I slowly worked the sparkler into the cigar, taking pains that it went in straight and did not cause any telltale bulges. With a toothpick I pushed it in as far as I could and then arranged the tobacco leaf so that you could not see the sanctity of the cigar had been violated. I placed it back into its cellophane wrapper and managed to paste the cellophane so you could not tell the wrapper had been opened. Then I placed the loaded cigar back into the drawer, and stirred the cigars about, so even I did not know which cigar had the sparkler in it.

I found out about a week later.

As usual, Dad came home from work, in the late long afternoon of a hot summer day. Nothing could be better than a can of beer, a cigar, and the newspaper.

With a slight smile on his face, he gripped his beer in his right hand and the cigar in his left, puffing pensively as he read the news. He took a good puff and returned his left hand to the edge of the table. As he exhaled, suddenly the cigar lit up in a blaze of glory. Dad looked at the cigar in astonishment, bellowed like a wounded bull, and leaped backwards off his stool with grace and spring that would credit an exceptionally agile ballerina. His beer fell across the newspaper, unheeded. With eyes as wide open as his eyelids would permit, Dad stared at the cigar for a moment open-mouthed. Then he rushed over and extinguished it in the sink.

He was still staring at the cigar with an open mouth when he turned around and saw me standing there. I suddenly realized it was not a good time to be standing there. Realization dawned on his face: he had a culprit. I decided it might be a good time to go down to the corner drugstore and see if there were any new comic books. I started edging for the door.

Still holding the sodden cigar at arm's length, Dad said, "Stop right there, young man." Dad was so shocked he forgot to be angry.

"Oh, hi, Dad, I was just heading down to the drugstore.”

"Did you have anything to do with this?" He waved the cigar at me.

George Washington and the cherry tree came to mind. "Well, come on, Dad, you told me you wanted to quit smoking.”

"You did this – what did you do? You did this to make me quit smoking?”

"You said so yourself, you said tobacco is bad for you and you wanted to quit smoking cigars, so I wanted to help you quit.”

"This is dangerous! What if I had been driving?”

"You never smoke when you drive." By this time the rest of the family had gathered to see what Dad had bellowed about, and Dad sputtered out that he had been sitting there peacefully smoking his cigar when all of a sudden it – he got the idea. "What did you do, put a sparkler in here?”

"That's right. I thought it would give you a surprise so you'd quit smoking.”

"How many more of my cigars have you booby-trapped?”

"Dad, I can't tell you that." There was only the one, but I sure wasn't going to let him know.

Very cautiously, very reluctantly, Dad pulled out the drawer and emptied the remaining cigars into the trash. "You know, I had been wondering why for the last week or so you kept standing there watching me read the newspaper with this big expectant look on your face.”

Six years ago, the KMT vote split between two candidates, throwing the election to the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) candidate, Chen Shui-bian, who took about 40% of the vote.

Two years ago, the day before the presidential election there was a ridiculous "assassination attempt," in which the "assassin" supposedly fired from straight in front of President Bean; the bullet crossed his belly horizontally from right to left, hit the knee of Vice President Lu, who was standing on his left and is shorter than he is, and then bounced into Bean's coat pocket. The deed was pinned on a man who committed suicide, with the authorities claiming that he left a note admitting his guilt. His family and friends protested, saying the suspect was morose about mounting debts; the authorities demanded the family apologize for contradicting them, and there the case stands. Bean won the election by 28,000 votes, taking about 40% of the total, and there have been plenty of questions about that election. Soldiers strongly support the KMT, so the day of the election, they were confined to base, and not permitted to vote. That sort of thing.

I don't think Bean has ever won an election by a majority. It's hard to say what he has done in six years in office, but apparently he has been busy, because he has confirmed allegations that he took money out of the public coffer, claiming it was for 'secret diplomacy.' So secret that you can't find any trace of diplomacy. For this and various and other sundry scandals, the former Chairman of the DPP, Shih Mingte, has called for Bean to resign. The public has responded enthusiastically.

Hundreds of thousands of people have thronged to the President's Office, wearing red, as a sign that Bean should resign. All last week, everywhere you went in Taipei, you saw people wearing red, going to the rally in groups of two or three, in the subway, on buses. For the most part, these are the office workers, civil servants, white collar workers, blue collar workers, but all in all, the middle class.

On Friday evening there was a huge march calling for Bean to resign, and for an end to corruption. From miles away, people finished dinner, rummaged through their closets to find red shirts, and went to the rally with friends, family, or people from work. The subways, buses, and streets were full of these people. A lot of Aborigines from Wulai went. Something that interested me was that a lot of Tayal teenagers went, especially boys. These are kids who usually have nothing more on their minds than flying squirrels, basketball, girls, and cars, but without anybody planning, one by one, they got on the bus or rode their motorcycles to the city to march in the rally. As far as I could see, each made a decision personally and, with no fanfare, went down to the city and joined the march. I asked some of them why they went to the march, because I have never seen them show the slightest interest in politics. "The DPP treats Aborigines like dirt." "Chen Shuibian is bad to Aborigines."

On Saturday there was a much smaller rally to support Bean, wearing Green. They brought in only a small fraction of the number of people wearing red, and most of the DPP bigwigs made excuses and stayed away. To repeat, all last week, everywhere you went you saw people wearing red. Yesterday, I passed right by the Support rally, and saw almost no Supporters. I saw an old man clutching green flags, trying to figure out how to find his way through Taipei Main Station. Near Merica, there was a group of thugs throwing trash and spitting betel juice all over the sidewalk, holding green flags. Other than that, I didn't see anybody from that rally. Apparently, the Green rally followed the usual formula for DPP rallies: bus in a bunch of old folks from the countryside, give them hats, tee shirts, box lunches, flags, and a stipend. A lot of thugs join the Rent-a-Crowd.

A reporter for a local television station was interviewing people in the Support rally. Soon Bean supporters jumped on the tv truck and shouted down the reporter. They started beating him with fists, feet, and flags printed with the rally's theme, Love & Hope. The police rescued the reporter, who was hospitalized by his injuries. Love, Hope, and Freedom of Speech and Press, DPP style.

What I think has escaped these Bean Supporters is that they have doomed the DPP, and weakened Taiwan considerably. Now, any vote for the DPP means you approve of corruption, ineptitude, and inaction. Not very promising.

photo courtesy of Bird Lai賴鵬智.
thanks again!

我聽秘密外交這個藉口很生氣，原因有兩個。

第一，我在民國六十年來臺灣時，很多人勸我不要來，因為中共揚言血洗臺灣，隨時要攻擊 (注：我是從越南戰區來臺灣的，而大家勸我留在越南比來臺灣安全)；我來不到一個月，日本斷交、中華民國退出聯合國，中共外交功勢洶湧，全世界看準自由中國臺灣命在旦夕，要被外交孤立，以致迅速滅亡。讓全世界的外交學者驚訝不已的是，臺灣的外交部居然能夠從夾縫出奇制勝：個國紛紛與中共建交的同時，與自由中國建立辦事處、文化交流處、貿易處；各種怪「處」問世，臺灣屹立不搖，中共束手無策。石油危機差點顛覆了歐美許多強國政府，中華民國反而蠻輕鬆地過關，在四面楚歌的垓心還能創出臺灣奇蹟；區區的臺灣在地圖上幾乎找不到，結果成為全球第十三大貿易國。
以前我們看到的臺灣外交是這樣扭轉乾坤、反敗為勝；現在呢？不是瓜就是貝：只有在瓜地馬拉、貝利斯這種地方才能發展。
好，假設你真的把錢拿去花在秘密外交上，那麼請問，外交上的成績在哪？在帛琉的沙灘上嗎？帛琉在哪裡？

第二，Bean向來給我的印象是，自視過高、自認不凡，好像他認為他可以唬住天下所有人。說子彈能轉彎，掉進口袋裡，哈利路雅，我相信！我相信！說女婿不聽話，壞了家規，我相信！說月球上有兔子搗長生不死之藥我也相信！說錢花在秘密外交上…把我當笨蛋嗎？

美國諺語說的好: You can fool all of the people some of the time, and you can fool some of the people all of the time, but you can't fool all of the people all of the time.

Something just occurred to me: Taipei doesn't smell the same as it did in the early 70s.

In those days, most of 敦化北路 north of the railroad tracks (現在的市民大道) was rice fields. The city was not built up beyond the fourth floor. There were many wooden houses, not many cars, open ditches by the roads, lots of people who still cooked with charcoal, more weeds, and far less cement and asphalt.

The city had an organic smell. It didn't smell as moldy as 汐止, but you could smell the damp. That smell has long since disappeared.

真有默契。
我跟張到邱老闆的店，可是邱老闆外出，只有老闆娘林小姐在。我第一次見到她。
聊一聊，她問我，你是外國人嗎？
張說：他不是。
我說：我是山地人。
林：真的嗎？
張：沒錯，他是我們烏來的山地人。
林：我不相信。
張：妳沒看過烏來的泰雅族很多這種長相嗎？
林：我不相信。
我：Balay balay bi, talah nonux qloyus nguhuw na Tayal knan.
林：那你身分證拿出來給我看。
張：他沒帶。
林：你看，明明是唬人的。
我：沒有哇，真的啦，我們山地人的證件都是木頭的，所以不好帶。
張：對呀，原住民的身分證都是刻在木頭上的。這是他們的傳統。
我：可是問題是，這樣很重，所以不好帶。所以，除非有事，不然通常不會帶在身上。
張：他們的身分證都刻的很漂亮，所以不用的時候，掛在牆上作裝飾。
我：是啊，去年Keqing的房子失火，結果全家的身分證都燒毀了。
張：沒有，他兒子帶身分證去游泳，當木筏坐在上面，所以回家的時候濕透了，所以沒燃燒。
我：喔，對對對，我忘了，可是我以為焦黑了。
張：沒有，只有燻黑，鄉公所說沒關係。
林：我不相信，你們在騙我。
張：騙妳幹什麼？這是他們的傳統。原住民哪有紙？沒有，可是木頭很多。
林：真的嗎？
我：妳沒看新聞嗎？以前我們到行政院抗議，要求不要用紙作的身分證，因為這不是我們的傳統，ini gaga Tayal，我們爭取用木頭作的身分證。
林：#@%!!***%#!@@!
_________
PS: 沒有Keqing這個人；keqing的意思是頭暈。

We love Taiwan: I did not make this up.
一家店的老闆，每次看到我進來，大開話匣子：外省人沒有一個好的(他是閩南人)，臺灣的問題都是國民黨造成的，不要相信客家人，愛臺灣，原住民都是番都是笨蛋很好騙，臺灣獨立的時候美國跟日本一定會派軍保護，是是是老闆說的是…
那天他女兒也在店裡，老闆突然說，我女兒比兒子好。
我驚訝，因為依我的經驗，越綠的人越大男人主義。我問為甚麼？
因為生她，我們到加拿大生。她是在加拿大生的。
有差嗎？
當然有差!她在加拿大生，醫院裡都是白種人，可是我兒子是在臺北生的，醫院裡醫生護士都是臺灣人，怎麼會好？我女兒生在加拿大，都是白種人，加拿大沒甚麼黑人，她當然比她哥哥好。

那家店，我不想再去。

英文是我的母語，我教了很久，所以我有把握，開口講就是對的；不管發音，不懂文法，說出口縱然偶爾不太對，可是非常少，錯的話也不會太嚴重，若嚴重，自己馬上察覺糾正。很多人講英文，雖不是母語也不教英文，但因為練習很久了，情形跟我一樣：說出口就好了，不要管發音、文法。但初學者一定不可以這樣：初學必須很注意發音，勤快練習句型，有耐心地加強聽力，一步一步來。

一個老太太到廟裡拜拜。廟公跟她說，「不用吃素。吃素吃葷，不要執著，酒肉穿腸過，何必執著？」

老太太困惑，問我。第一，穿腸這句出自小說家誇張寫法，濟公活佛絕對沒有講過這麼沒有水準的話。濟公活佛持戒森嚴，邪靈假藉他的帽子作出喝酒狀，這是旁門左道，這不是佛法。(佛菩薩哪有靠乩童顯靈？有沒有腦袋？)

第二，縱使有穿腸，那是活佛的境界，你能嗎？民國初年的金山活佛常吃廚餘，發臭發酸他照樣吃，你能嗎？你已經修成活佛，你才資格說穿腸。

我沒有那種程度。我很想去找那個廟公，灑一泡尿、撿一堆狗屎給他：「你能不執著嗎？你要把這個當美酒佳餚吃下去；不能的話，趕快給我爬到馬祖面前懺悔。」

順便踹幾腳：不要執著！踹腳即非踹腳，是名踹腳，廟公不是境界很高嗎？連被踹幾腳都要執著嗎？

The second wife of Jefferson Davis was Varina Howell Davis, who he married in 1845. Nobody in their right mind would name their daughter Varina nowadays.

From the LA Times Book Review, August 13, 2006, R4
The Looming Tower by Lawrence Wright, reviewed by Daniel Hurtz-Phelan
…John O'Neill, a swaggering, loud-mouthed FBI agent who, as the head of its counterterrorist unit, became so obsessed with Bin Laden that "his colleagues began to question his judgment." For most Americans, within government and without, Al Qaeda was "too bizarre, too primitive and exotic" to take seriously. "Up against the confidence Americans placed in modernity and technology," Wright observes, "the defiant gestures of bin Laden and his followers seemed absurd and even pathetic.”

O'Neill and a handful of his colleagues tried frantically to make everyone else grasp the danger, especially after Al Qaeda bombed US embassies in Africa in 1998 and the US destroyer Cole in 2000. One FBI agent, after being prevented by bureaucratic regulations from examining a suspected terrorist's laptop (which might have revealed the 9/11 plot weeks before it happened), angrily and eerily told his superiors that he was just "trying to keep someone from taking a plane and crashing it into the World Trade Center." But in most cases, these Cassandras had burned out by the time their unheeded warnings proved prescient. On the morning of September 11, O'Neill had just started a lucrative new job as head of security at the World Trade Center.

Thomas Carlyle wrote, concerning the blindness and conservatism of the ruling class before the French Revolution, "A political party that knows not when it is beaten may become one of the fatalest thing to itself & to all."

And a president?

________________
photo courtesy of Bird賴鵬智. Thanks!

One afternoon a couple years ago I was sitting out on the second floor porch facing east playing the recorder. A movement to the northeast caught my eye, but when I turned that way, I didn't see anything, so I continued my efforts with Bach. A moment later my attention was called northeast again. I took a careful look and seemed to see something moving on the rarely traveled road from Tampya, across the valley, maybe two kilometers away in a straight line. I got out my binoculars and could make out a group of people there, apparently enjoying the view.

Barnard DeVoto described how the mountain men, trappers who roamed the Great Plains and Rockies in the early 19th century, were so attuned to their surroundings that they noticed slight movements from miles away. I had never believed that before.

Ho ho. As I typed this, I was interrupted by Yumin's barking. I stuck my head out the window to hush him, and smelled the odor of a man who had smoked a cigarette and had a drink and apparently passed down the old path, twenty meters away through the jungle. Go bite him, stout Yumin!

Sign of the times
In the Taipei Main Station Underground Mall, I watched a tiny little toddler, not even three years old, just barely old enough to walk by himself, chatting briskly on a cell phone as he strolled with his mother.

Wonder what he'll be like when he grows up.

臺灣有一個極大的問題：一廂情願。越綠，主觀越重，認為自己想聽的就是真理，沒有辦法也沒有意願採取其它想法，不假設，不推想，不肯去想「萬一」。

不是你認為不會發生，事情就不可能會發生的；一廂情願的思路是死路。喊「愛臺灣」的人如果真的愛臺灣，必須打破陳舊、狹隘思想的窠臼，必須勇敢面對世局。

極右派到靖國神社一拜，得罪了所有鄰近國家與美國執政者。好哇，你那麼崇拜那些為了侵略、為了反對民主反對自由而死去的鬼，你去叫牠們救你呀。自己認為李登輝拜日本國旗對，就可以講出一千個理由說明為甚麼他這樣做是對的；問題是，大家唾棄、沒人想理。一意孤行，想法太沒有彈性，沒有意願依它人眼光看事情、由其它角度衡量得失、了解多數人的想法、想一想alternatives。我認為怎樣，事情就應該怎樣。
(漢人沉默願蒙辱，甚至奴言婢膝崇拜黷武的軍閥，起碼高金素妹帶族人爭一口氣: loqah Tayal beh!)

美國偶而玩一下臺灣牌，攖一攖中共逆鱗好玩；但是這牌不好玩的時候，棄之如敝屣。可是我到目前為止，還沒聽過人討論，萬一換國旗，怎麼辦？大家的心態好像是說，我們不去想，事情就不會發生。因此完全沒有Plan B。原來駝鳥的分佈，不限于非洲。

我聽過一些很離譜的想法：臺灣如果有事，美國一定來救；日本會制裁中共：一個比一個荒謬。就是沒有人願意面對實局深入思攷。如果有Plan B的話，頂多就是怎樣把大官的兒子、財產送出去。

可能是我不忠于黨，也不太在乎旗色。誰執政，哪一個黨逞強，不重要；我覺得重要的是，臺灣老百姓生活過得好嗎？包括身、心、靈，不只是經濟，還有文化、教育、倫理、環境、胸襟、視野、風氣、想法、生活態度。古人說，謀及子孫。臺灣政壇上，太多人說，謀及權勢罷了。很多綠選民，頭腦滯留在爺爺年代，無暇顧及子孫。我不藍不綠，但我覺得藍選民比較能為未來著想，不是永遠翻舊帳、懷念一個從來沒有存在過的過去世界。

中國歷史，久分必合，久合必分。中央無力過問，暫容它土皇帝逍遙，只要不要太過分，有空的話記得往皇京方向磕個頭，或起碼點個頭，就不太管它。但如果中央有力，卻有人想私自站有版圖的小小角落、不甩京城老大，就一定派軍收拾乾淨。給京面子，不太計較；不顧京畿大人臉面，誅戮殄滅。幾千年來都是如此，沒有例外。

美軍Pentagon作長期計畫單位已經咬定中共海軍由臺灣各港出海；這是他們預估未來局勢不置疑的前提。美國軍方估計，假設中共武力解放臺灣，如果所有一切條件對臺灣有利，最久可以撐二十二小時才投降。可是我認為，中共不會笨到發動解放軍(更何況，在他們眼中臺灣不是一個很大的問題)。隔岸觀火，讓臺灣自己爛，之後進來救人。

難道我們不該想一下Plan B嗎？

photo courtesy of Bird 賴鵬智. Thanks again!

明‧李隨‧醉醒石：人最打不破是貪利。一利利，便只顧自己手底肥，囊中飽。便不顧體面，不顧親知，不顧羞恥，因而不顧王法，不顧天理。在仕宦為尤甚。總是為農為商的，剋剝貪求，是有限量的。到了仕宦，打罵得人，驅使得人，勢做得開，露了一點貪心，便有一干來承迎勾誘，不可底止。

A couple years after I graduated from college and started teaching English, I got dragged off to a dinner with a bunch of rich businessmen: a native foreigner who speaks Chinese! better than a talking dog.

During the meal, Chairman Tsai made a point of looking at his watch, which was very gaudy, so of course the others had to compliment him on it. "Oh yes, this is something I picked up for US$12,000 in Hong Kong, just a trinket.”

General Manager Chen pulled back his sleeve and said, "Oh yes, a couple months ago in Switzerland I happened to see this, and since it was only US$18,000, I decided to buy it, just for fun.”

Boss Wang showed his watch, "Oh yes, I really need to get a new watch, this one is a real cheapo, it cost me only US$10,000.”

I pulled on the shoestring attached to my belt loop and pulled my pocket watch out of my pocket and looked at it carefully. "Chairman Tsai, what time is it by your watch?”

"What? Oh, it's 7:25.”

"General Manager Chen, what time is it by your watch?”

"It's 7:25.”

"Boss Wang, what time is it by your watch?”

"It's 7:25.”

"My father bought me this pocket watch at Sears for US$2.95, and it says 7:25, too." I stuffed my watch back into my pocket and resumed eating.

Funny, they never invited me out to dinner again.

My parents didn't raise me to be a diplomat. Or a talking dog.

新聞: 陳水扁離開了台北，心情舒暢多了
哪有這種總統？愛土、愛民、愛國的心，應是回歸才舒暢。蔣中正何時離開過臺灣？對岸喊要血洗臺灣時，他堅守臺灣寶島不離開，讓各大國派總統、副總統等大官來拜訪，而不是他坐飛機到名不見經傳的小國，希望他們允許他下降。

其實也不能怪President Bean想往國外跑，卸了任以後哪有機會用納稅人的錢到南洋去玩？還有專機耶!你坐過空軍一號嗎？一定沒有，我們只有出油錢的份，無福搭機到處玩，還有女空官充空姐。

可是陳為甚麼那麼堅持要當總統？不懂。幾年前他到中美洲一個名不見經傳的小國去玩對不起寫錯了去進行他的偉大外交功勢時，說，「中華民國係啥物件，我嘛無宰羊，」既然在外國講了這麼丟臉的話，否定了自己的頭銜，為甚麼今天又死皮賴臉不肯放呢？

不過，我有一個message想傳給帛琉總統：Dear President of Palau, We are very happy that President Bean has gone to visit you. If you like him, please keep him. We don't want him back. Thank you very much.

Qalux sure has rotten luck. Driving a bus is hard work and the hours are long. The weather is cooling off: just right for napping. He hit that long light at Hsinhai Road just as it turned red, shut his eyes for a moment, and bang, fell asleep.

That wouldn't be so bad, but as luck would have it, just at the moment the light turned green, who should pull up next to his bus but Chang and I, who almost never go to that area. Talk about timing! We guffawed when we saw him sprawled in his driver's throne, oblivious to traffic and the changing light. We both shouted and Chang honked. We saw Qalux jerk awake. Laughing heartily, we raced ahead, detoured into Jingmei, and got him a big cup of coffee. We caught up with him in New Store. I hailed the bus at the New Store subway terminal stop, jumped on, thrust the coffee into his hands, and jumped back off the bus.

We waited for him at the end of the route. He came off his bus laughing. "I don't know what happened, I just shut my eyes for a moment, and all of a sudden I heard one of the passengers coughing loudly. I realized I had fallen asleep, so what could I do? I said as loud as I could 'Amen! Lord, that's all I can pray for now, the light has turned so I have to drive my bus. Amen!'"

Quick thinking. Don't know if it fooled anybody, but quick thinking.