Yadi yada

We were together. I forget the rest.

-Walt Whitman


(Does anyone know which exact poem this line came from? My Google skills bring up no answers.)

CBRIII #11: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz

I often think to myself how exceptionally lucky I am to be who I am. I mostly credit my mother, my good fortune at being born an American and my multicultured upbringing (which I guess can also be attributed to my mother.) Yet reading about Junot Diaz's hero, Oscar, really made me think about this definition of luck, and how when turned on its head, it can also be seen as fate, or better yet, as destiny.

A lot has been written on Pajiba about Junot Diaz's book and I'm pretty sure I've seen it on two Pajiba's Best-Of's list, so there's not much I can say about the plot that you haven't already heard. The Brief Wondrous Life os Oscar Wao follows two generations of a Dominican family, one of them being of Oscar and his sister, Lola, which is pretty much present-time in New Jersey, and the other of their mother, Beli, who lived in the Dominican Republic under the tyrannical rule of D.R.'s dictator, Rafael Trujillo. From the beginning, the narrator has said that Oscar's family was cursed—though he also says that every Dominican family believes themselves cursed in some way. As each family member throws themselves headfirst into disastrous situations without thinking, I started to wondering about this "curse." Is it a curse if they are doing what they want, what they feel they need or have to do? Does making it a curse make it less of a personal choice, and more of a question of them fulfilling their destiny? I just couldn't shake the feeling that when put under the blanket guise of a Dominican curse, their actions seem to take on greater weight, when really, the heady consequences should have been enough to make it a conscious stupid choice made by conscious stupid humans.

If it sounds like I'm insulting the characters, I really don't mean to. After all, human beings do stupid shit that is unfathomable even to themselves, especially when it comes to love, which is where this entire family seem to to excel in fucking up.

Our hero, Oscar, is an overweight nerd who is the antithesis of a playboy Dominican, struggling between trying to claim his Dominican identity and being stuck in his painfully geeky ways. He can't navigate the world of women and is a virgin that wants so badly to have someone fall in love with him. The title of the book pretty much gives away his ending, yet I couldn't help but root for him and hope that everything will be ok for him in the end.

Meanwhile, his sister, who fights violently with his mother, can't seem to stay away from Yunior, also the narrator of this book, who cheats on her constantly. As for their volatile mother, Beli grew up in the DR and had to leave eventually because she kept falling in love with the wrong man.

Reading back on what I wrote, I know I'm not really doing the plot any justice, but I think the best part about this book is Junot's use of language, and how he has infused the DR history with a lyrical, hip-hop beat, while also making it so completely engrossing to read. After I was done with this, I did a quick Google read on Rafael Trujillo, and you know what? Not as interesting. That might have been my favorite part of the book, just learning about the history of a country while also getting a sense of the culture and myths that can't be necessarily articulated in a history book. There is a sense of magical realism throughout, which adds to this notion of a family curse—as I said, take away the curse, and you just have human actions. Likewise, Junot's writing elevates the plot from just a romance novel to a literary masterpiece.

Slightly different from the usual work day...

Eating in Cambodia, part two

Did I ever mention I'm part of a food-blogging trio? Well, before I moved to Phnom Penh, we were just roaming around NYC eating and having fun, and then writing about it after. The other two, Rachizle and Etanbomb, are pretty voracious eaters too (and funny) so we just call ourselves funeaters.

Anyway, I did my first food post from PP about crab in Kep, so do check it out.

Fun Eaters!

CBR #10: Saturday by Ian McEwan

My one Ian McEwan choice from the last CBR cycle had resulted in my loathing it, so I really did not feel compelled to go search for another. But Saturday stuck out in my mind from a review I read long ago (I don't know if it was CBR, but it very well could have been. In fact, I'm 99% sure it was)—the concept of a narrative unfolding in real-time really appealed to me, so when I spied Saturday on the bookshelf of the house I'm staying in Phnom Penh, I decided to give McEwan another try.

The book follows a single day in Henry Perowne's life, beginning before dawn in the morning when he finds himself awake for no apparent reason, to late at night when he has just returned home from being on-call in the ER. Henry is a middle-aged man who really is very lucky: He is a highly-regarded brain surgeon in London who remains in love with his wife of over-20 years, and has two grown-up children who are both successful in their careers. He is not emotionally troubled, nor is he dissatisfied with his life. Why then, he wondered, was he aroused from his slumber and unable to return to sleep?

This particular Saturday takes places after 9/11, but before the US invades Iraq. This stage is clearly set by McEwan because throughout this Saturday, Henry is filled with thoughts about the rightness and wrongness of going to war. McEwan doesn't really care about the politics of it too much—what he's interested in conveying is the uncertainty and investment that an individual can have over a situation that he has no control over. Why should Henry worry about a war going on thousands of miles away, one that he will not have a decision on or have any way to affect it? And yet the war creeps into his thoughts throughout the day.

McEwan's skill in Saturday is in making the mundane seem interesting. We follow Henry through the morning with his son, then his drive to his squash game with his friend (and anesthesiologist) before which he encountered some car trouble, then to a fish market to pick up ingredients for family reunion that includes his daughter who lives away from home and his wife's turbulent poet-father. There is also a pit stop to a nursing home to see his mother who does not remember him nor herself before he goes to attend a rehearsal by his son's jazz band.

Oh, I'm sorry—did I gloss over the car trouble? Because it turns out to be the "start" click on the timer to the ticking bomb. On his way to his game, Henry gets into a small car accident with Baxter (who I pictured as Tug from the fantastic movie, "Brick") He's aggressive and unable to stop fidgeting. To the untrained eye, Baxter looks like a real "character"—like his adopted mannerisms are from being a tough street kid. But the brain surgeon in Henry is able to diagnose Baxter's behavior to a degenerative disease (Spoiler: Think 13 from House.) Talking his way out of an altercation using his medical knowledge, Henry is able to escape Baxter and continue on his day as planned. But like his feelings on the impending Iraq war, thoughts of Baxter keep seeping into his consciousness and he's unable to shake his feelings of guilt at the situation. Part of it stems from him manipulating a vulnerable person by using his medical knowledge, but the other part is because Henry is essentially healthy, rich and happy. He leads a trouble-less life and when he holds his fulfilled and promising life up against Baxter's caged existence, Henry can't help but feel dread.

And dread is where McEwan really excels. Some of Henry's thoughts are lazy and lead to nowhere, but after his encounter with Baxter, I kept waiting and waiting for something terrible to happen. Some "boring" section about him buying fish turns into his musings on whether fish feel pain when they are being cooked (This stuck with me: "It's fortunate for the fishmonger and his customers that sea creatures are not adapted to make use of sound waves and have no voice. Otherwise there'd be howling from those crates.") and about the nature of chance when it comes to the newspaper wrappings of the fish (Yea, a stretch, but it was actually pretty genius of McEwan.) By the time I got the the climax, his use of language already had me reeling from all the terrible visions of what's to come that I feared the absolute worst.

And to be honest, I couldn't have possibly seen the end coming. This book was a serious heart-thumper for me, and I was surprised by how much I thought about it after-the-fact. It is absolutely brilliantly written (Of course, it's McEwan. Even when the story is bad, the language is insane). But my favorite part about the book has to be the protagonist, Henry, and how he just seems so ordinary. Yet despite his vanilla-ness, he was not boring.

On being upset.

“I thought that you were an anchor in the drift of the world; but no: there isn’t an anchor anywhere. There isn’t an anchor in the drift of the world. Oh no. I thought you were. Oh no. The drift of the world." - William Bronk

(The above photo was taken at Choeung Ek. It was a brilliantly sunny day when I went there three weeks ago, and I couldn't help but stare at the ground for any bone remnants. I only took about three photos - it felt weird to take any. Though it is possible to muster up anger at Choeung Ek, I think I felt sadness more than anything else.)

Thrifting in Phnom Penh...

... is absolutely "deadly," as my Irish friend would say. I got this awesome dress for $3 at some hole-in-the-wall place.

Headline of the Day

If World Ends, So Does Alternate-Side Parking

Thank you, NYT.

I actually know a couple Brooklynites who'll be very happy about this.

CBRIII #9: The Imperfectionists by Tom Rachman

When I left my job, one of my bosses (I had probably 3 bosses, which did not make life easy) handed me The Imperfectionists as a gift at my office's going-away party. Since I don't really read book reviews and therefore know nothing about Tom Rachman's novel, my first thought was quite defensive: What are you trying to tell me here, huh?? Then my co-workers told me that this book is actually pretty perfect for me since it chronicles the lives of the staff members of an English-language daily newspaper in Rome. After devouring the pages (figuratively, not literally - I read it in a day and a half), I can only hope that the fates of the book's characters is not what I have to look forward to.

Tucked inbetween the chapters of The Imperfectionist is the origins story of the paper, of how it was conceived by a wealthy business man who kept his passions and motivations a secret, even from his own family. Meanwhile, each chapter follows a staff member, and there is even one devoted to a faithful reader of the paper. Beginning with Llyod Burko, a freelance writer past his prime whose children from his four ex-wives refuse to have anything to do with him, Rachman sets a seriously depressing tone that is only lifted during moments of dry newspaper humor.

There is Arthur Gopal, an obituary writer who gets by with doing minimal work; Craig Menzies, a news editor who hates his job and is disrespected because the entire office knows that his girlfriend cheated on him; Hardy Benjamin, a business reporter whose name seems to be the only thing about her that commands respect as she seems willing to contend herself with mediocrity; Kathleen Solson, the editor-in-chief who reacts with indifference to the realization that her husband has cheated on her and contemplates a dalliance with an old, now-married boyfriend; Abbey Pinnola, the financial officer who has to wrestle daily with the corporate company over layoffs, and then finds herself sitting next to the copy editor she just fired on a flight to Atlanta.

Truly, the only person who seems remotely happy with his existence is Herman Cohen, the corrections editor. Though portrayed in the beginning as a crotchety old man who nitpicks on the mistakes that appear in the paper, he is the only one who is happy, without compromise, with his life at the paper and at home. (By the way, Herman's entry in the newspaper's style book for the word "literally" reads: "This word should be deleted. All too often, actions described as 'literally' did not happen at all. As in, 'He literally jumped out of his skin.' No, he did not... Eliminate on sight.")

All of which made me very nervous and apprehensive while reading this. I'm old enough now to know that happiness is relative and is often a work in progress throughout my adult life. It's bad enough that the journalism industry stereotypes perpetuate that every working journalist is either an alcoholic or a drug user who has probably been divorced three times. But to see all these characters portrayed as cynical, un-self-aware, sad, desperate - well, it made me wonder what the up side is to my chosen profession.

Probably the most depressing part of this book concerns its protaganist, the unnamed newspaper. It was disheartening to read of the newspaper's glory days under the first and second publisher, while alternately experiencing the sad encounters of the individuals who are now running it into its eventual demise (Oops, spoiler. But you probably saw it coming.) While reading this, I kept aching for more - more of a closure for many of the characters, more happiness for some of the saddest, un-self-respecting individuals, and just more of the newspaper lore. This is a well-written and poignant novel, but if you are a journalist, it doesn't give you much hope.

Country Living/Leaving

This was where I spent most of my weekend.

I went to my uncle's house in upstate New York, and it was wonderful just to get away from the city, if only for just 24 hours. I arrived there Friday night, slept in a bedroom that was built in the 1700s (and was just a bit disappointed that I wasn't awaken in the middle of the night by ghosts), biked along an old rail trail on Saturday afternoon and spent time playing with my little cousin. Then I was on the 7:45 p.m. train and whisked back to the city.

My uncle, his daughter and his wife

When I arrived at Port Authority, I made my way to the ACE. Some guy violently bumped into me and I looked up (from texting, of course), annoyed, and glared at him. He quickly apologized, and instead of saying, "It's ok," I snapped, "Dude, watch where you're going." I instantly regretted being rude but didn't know how to take it back. The kid was younger than me, looked like he was from out of town and looked seriously freaked. He disappeared before I could figure out an appropriate way to apologize.

Perhaps I've been in New York a little too long? Six years ago, I would have accepted that apology without a second thought; yesterday, I had to bite my tongue from saying something inappropriate.

I suppose these thoughts are only natural since I am actually leaving the city. I am leaving the country, to be more exact, on May 1 to Cambodia for a new job. I am absolutely thrilled/nervous/thankful for this opportunity and jumped at the chance when it was offered – but a part of me wondered if I was ready to leave this city I love so much. An old friend of mine said once, "I don't think people should leave New York until they absolutely cannot live here anymore." Her reasoning was that if we left before we were ready to, we'd always keep coming back, searching for that new shiny life, and being disappointed over and over again. It's a little bleak, for sure, but it's difficult to take an optimistic point of view when city living can beat you down with the high rents, high expenses and rude people (Exhibit A: me.)

On the other hand, I could also argue that the people of New York, be them transplants or actual locals (not an urban myth by the way), are some of the best people I have ever met. There are so many that are genuine and interesting and weird and strange and hardworking and good – I have become much more open-minded to so many different types of people, and I am always able to see the goodness in them. They (we – because as my uncle said, I am a New Yorker, even if I'm not) can be brusque and a little rough around the edges. But what you see is what you get, and if you don't like it, we really don't care.

My favorite quintessential New York Summer photo. Taken in 2007, I think.

So no, I'm not quite ready to leave here yet. But I am so ready to start on my new gig. Anyway, I'll always be back.