Bizarre biwa instrument

The Japanese biwa is a lute derived from the Chinese pipa and earlier Asian lutes.  The Japanese film Kwaidan, based on Lafcadio Hearn’s book about ghosts, includes a story about Hoichi, the blind biwa player.  Traditionally,  biwa  music centers on the Tale of the Heike, a clan war of ancient times.  

Very eerie vocalization to be sure.

Here even a gaijin (foreigner) gets in on the action.

Here is the Chinese pipa instrument that preceded the biwa.

Anniversary of Hungarian Revolt of 1956

October 23, 1956 was the start of the Hungarian revolution against the puppet state set up by the Soviets.  This event followed smaller revolts in East Germany in 1953 and 1956, as well as Khrushchev's famous "secret speech" revealing Stalin's abominable reign as Soviet tyrant.  Up to that point Comrade Stalin had been thought of as stern but kind Uncle Joe, thanks to years of Soviet propaganda, swallowed wholeheartedly by the captives of his empire and free people alike.  Rumors emerged that some of Khrushchev's audience at the 20th Congress went home and had heart attacks or committed suicide, such was the shock of the small peek at the truth K allowed. 

This is the time when many communists left the party in Great Britain, US, Italy and France, for example, not being able to stomach the Russian medicine for Hungarian disobedience.  

 

When the Russian tanks and soldiers entered Budapest on Nov. 4, 1956 to reconquer the country as a subservient state, all pretense of  the fraternity of socialist states was shattered to all who chose not to delude themselves any longer. 

Balinese music, new to me...

Lots of percussion it seems from my limited musical knowledge.

Called gamelan, pronounced GAM-e-lan.  Influenced  Battlestar Galactica season 3 soundtrack.  Guess I never liked that show, though this kind of spooky music would go well with sci fi (sorry Harlan Ellison).  (He hates that phrase.)  Not a viable option compared to Babylon 5 for example, or Deep Space Nine. 

Huichol art

Some Huichol yarn paintings.  Surprisingly, these art forms of using beads or yarn held in place by resin or wax didn't develop until the early 1960's supposedly at the suggestion of an American artist.  The original inspiration of many subjects is of course peyote visions.

Beaded figurines and "paintings."  There's even a VW "Bug" car covered with over 2 million beads in some museum. 

Some Crazy African Greys

Greys seem to pick up on telephone conversations really well.

More Alan Watts

Here he takes a somewhat Ram Dass-ian Hindu perspective of life as a game of hide and seek, or the divine disguised as oneself and the world.  This perspective is all fine and dandy but without an efficient technique of cultivating and making this realization an inner experience, it is likely to fade away during the daily grind of existence.  

I think what can remedy this is the daily discipline of sitting meditation.  All skills are acquired through disciplined practice of a proper technique, and the skill of becoming fully awake and staying that way is no exception.

Tara mantra

Tara is a female Buddha that comes in many forms, most common white or green.  White Tara represents compassion, long life, healing and serenity, while Green Tara is enlightened activity that removes obstacles, fears and worries.  All in all there are 21 emanations.  As John Blofeld points out, the Chinese Kuan Yin is not a female version of the male Avalokiteshvara but rather a Chinese version of the Tibetan Tara figure.

 

21 emanations of Tara above.

This Russian video about Tara certainly pulls out all the stops.

Roman Army

A few examples of Roman reenactments, the Germans and the British seem to be the most avid fans.

From the Sublime to the Silly

Having viewed a few blogs about pens I purchased a blue Kaweco Sport AL with medium nib a while back.  The AL I presume stands for aluminum, which is what the guy in the video is trying to remember at one point.  This is a fountain pen.  It is designed to hold their own ink cartridges only, and apparently many lamented there was no converter for it.  A converter is a device with a piston inside that enables one to use ink from a bottle, and is inserted in the pen where the original cartridge is located.  Recently I discovered Kaweco now makes a converter for its Sport pen, as explained in the video located at this site. For Kaweco Sport fans, this is a big deal as now they can use their favorite ink with it.

Kaweco sounds like a Japanese company but is actually German, it started in Heidelberg in the 1880's.  This particular pen is quite short but one can make it longer by placing the cap on the end when writing.

There are a lot of interesting pen blogs out there on the Internet, it seems that really good fountain pens quite often cost over a hundred dollars, so it can get to be an expensive hobby if one takes it seriously.  Another German pen that is popular but not so expensive is the Lamy Safari series, for example.  

 

Alan Watts on Buddhism

One of the great popularizers of Buddhism in the West, a man who like Allen Ginsberg created his own career out of his following his Muse. 

Yet More Moody Blues

"Have You Heard" track from 1969 album "On the Threshold of a Dream."  Some rather mellow lyrics:

Now you know that you are real,
Show your friends that you and me
Belong to the same world,
Turned on to the same word,
Have you heard?

Now you know that you are free,
Living all your life at ease.
Each day has it's always,
A look down life's hallways, doorways,
To lead you there.

Now you know how nice it feels,
Scatter good seed in the fields.
Life's ours for the making,
Eternity's waiting, waiting,
For you and me.
Now you know that you are real,
Show your friends that you and me
 
Belong to the same world,
Turned on to the same word,
Have you heard?


The verse: "Now you know that you are real," followed by "Now you know that you are free," and "Now you know how nice it feels" all sound almost like Gnostic or mystical sayings about some sort of spiritual realization.  Note the repetition of the word know.   It's not a statement of personal opinion but rather the certainty of some positive force one has encountered within and without oneself, presumably.  And as with many such numinous experiences, one encounters a sense of eternity that one would like to share with one's friends.  This might even be called the "eternal now" mystics talk about, as now is repeated just as often as the word know in the song.  One might say that nowness is the key to eternity.  For example: Living all your life at ease, Each day has it's always seems to reinforce this idea of the importance of living in the moment, the present blossoming into eternity.

Marcus Aurelius - The Stoic Emperor

Today is not only St. Patrick's Day but the anniversary of the death of the Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius, who died from the same plague that wiped out millions in the Empire at that time.  This was at Vindobono, modern day Vienna, on the Danube River, when he died in 180 AD after four years of holding back a Germanic incursion into the heart of the Empire.  Thus he kept the Roman Empire breathing room for a century before further problems developed, leaving the Empire vulnerable to outside incursions.

Rome had a running battle with barbarians almost from its start: the Gauls sacked Rome in 387 BC, they invaded in 225 BC, in 113 Germanic tribes defeated Roman armies and invaded Gaul and Spain, in 102 BC Marius defeated part of them, in 9 AD an entire legion was lost in the Teutoburg Forest, in the years up to 180 AD we have Aurelius preventing a breakthrough by Germanic tribes, in 255 Goths invade Macedonia and later Greece, in 378 Visigoths defeat the Eastern Emperor at Adrianople,in 410 they sack Rome. 

So aside from being a brilliant advocate of Stoicism in his Meditations, Aurelius sacrificed his comfort and life to preserve civilization from the recurrent barbarian incursions and thus kept the flame of Greco-Roman culture going longer than it might have.

Falchion sword

 

 

The falchion sword was popular in Europe between the 11th and 16th centuries.  At first modern historians thought it was a poor man's weapon, but later realized it was often used by knights as well.  Being a single-edged one handed weapon, yet not overly heavy, it could be wielded like a large meat cleaver with great effect.  It was primarily a cutting weapon, and could hack off limbs, but the sharp tip could penetrate chain mail as well.

Dinky Toys

A brief history of the company by a collector.  These toys, especially the military models, were popular with kids in the 1950's.  

My favorite, the Centurion tank.

Some pretty amazing restoration projects, a history of Dinky output in itself.

Wei Wu Wei

This is the cognomen adopted by Terence Gray, an Irish aristocrat who started publishing a series of mystifying books about mysticism during the 50's and 60's, which along with those of Reps and Alan Watts were Western takes on Zen.  Meaning action of non-action, a Taoist concept,  Gray writes about the paradoxical explanations of such teachers as Hui Neng, Ramana Maharshi, Padma Sambhava and Huang Po.  He especially elaborates what I consider the extreme stance of Shen Hui, who insisted that since enlightenment is sudden, there is no method or way to "practice" attaining it.  There is a nice paper by Hoyu Ishida on this, which takes Shen Hui to task for proposing that since humans are already enlightened there is no need for practice, i.e. meditation.  While other teachers have advocated the former proposition, they reject the latter.  Without the formal discipline of sitting meditation practice, realization of one's innate buddha nature will never happen, because the mind is too chaotic, not to mention seductive in assuring us all is well and good as long as we think we are already enlightened.  

Wei Wu Wei does offer many good down to earth explanations of obscure Eastern doctrines, such as anatta, or non-self.  He says for example: "We do not possess an 'ego'.  We are possessed by the idea of one."   There are a few examples quoted here at a website devoted to his teachings. 

American Pie Revisited

This seems to have been the first long narrative mysterious song that defied explanation for many, coming out in 1971.  There had been previous obscure songs by Dylan, for example Subterranean Homesick Blues and Mr. Tambourine Man, and the Beatles with Strawberry Fields and I Am the Walrus, but this one by Don McLean intrigued everyone.  Obviously it was a poetic history of rock and roll but interpretation was difficult.  There is one here that seems quite good, and goes on for a few more pages in a thorough explanation verse by verse. 

African Greys

These guys are pretty good.  I'll have to film my birds someday, they have a language of their own.

Padma Sambhava

Padma Sambhava, or Guru Rinpoche, is the all-around culture hero of Tibet, coming from the south in the 8th century.  He is famous for the introduction of tantric teachings which later became the foundation of the Nyingma school of Tibetan Buddhism.  Many stories are told of his overcoming the opposition of the native shamanistic Bon religion, and at the end of his life, took his leave of his disciples and walked off into the mountains never to be seen again. 

The first video is so quirky I had to include it.  The second has great visual representations of Guru Rinpoche.  The third has his 7 line supplication in Tibetan.  In English it goes like this:

Hum
In the northwest of the land of Uddiyana
On a blooming lotus flower
You have attained supreme, wondrous siddhi
You are renowned as Padmakara
Surrounded by your retinue of many dakinis
We practice following your example
Please approach and grant your blessing
Guru Padma Siddhi Hum

The mantra that many Western Buddhists learn is: Om Ah Hum Vajra Guru Padma Siddhi Hum, sometimes followed by Vajra Samaja Siddhi Phalam Hum Phat!  With a gesture of the hands folded together chest high, facing forward and shooting outwards on Phat!  An alternative is a snap of the fingers.  Or so I learned from one devotee.

Some Oldtime Bluegrass

Earl Scruggs in first two, then together with Lester Flatt below ...they had a band named the Foggy Mountain Boys that was pretty successful.  In the movie O Brother, Where Art Thou? the band formed by the heroes is called the Soggy Bottom Boys, in tribute to the real band.

Crazy for Kokopelli

If you do an Internet search for Kokopelli, the browser might give you a list of possible choices associated with that word, such as: suites, wine, inn, golf club, images, bedding, meaning, trail and bed and breakfast.  This shows just how popular and widespread (mainly in the Southwest) Kokopelli has become.  Originally a fertility deity that caught on later with the  Pueblo Indians of New Mexico, it could represent Aztec traders from the South carrying sacks over their shoulders.  Often combining trade with storytelling and news, these men would announce their presence with flute playing before entering a village, to forestall any suspicions of the people. 

Japanese Koto Music

The koto, like many Japanese instruments, came from China, but evolved in its own way after that. It sits on the floor or is placed on a stand and measures over 6 feet in length.  It belongs to the zither family of stringed instruments.  Often used with shakuhachi flute to create so-called meditation music.

Shopping Cart Etiquette at the Market

If you look this subject up in an online search engine you will find quite a few entries from people in the form of blog entries, discussion groups, videos and so forth.  Obviously it is a hot topic, although a minor one from the point of view of the Big Issues of Life. Here is one site that analyzes all this in a practical manner.  But given the intensity of these entries or rants, it is an issue that doesn't go away, and unless one is wealthy enough to send others to do one's shopping, it is an irritation one has to always deal with. 

There are two subdivisions of this issue, that of parking lot problems with shopping carts, and that of maneuvering a cart within the store aisles.  I want to deal just with the latter issue.  Naturally there are the obvious problems of people blocking aisles with their cart and themselves while they wander away or stand staring at the shelves, or rolling along too fast through aisle intersections without slowing down.  One issue that I find appalling that isn't mentioned much is how shoppers stop their carts in front of the meat section or the cold foods compartments, preventing  anyone else from having access to about eight feet of that section, or being able to open the glass doors the compartment area.  

One of the things Buddhist meditation practice aims at is to cultivate mindfulness in what is termed the post-meditation experience, when we are finished with our formal sitting practice and we return to the world of our daily affairs.  If we can't avoid being a nuisance to others in the simple act of grocery shopping, then we haven't practiced properly.  The idea is to allow us to better see the play of our mind, its fickleness jumping from one thought to another, and to realize how heavy and compulsive much of this thought process actually is.  We would like our meditation practice to open us up a little, bringing a sense of lightness and upliftedness to our mind. In this way we can apply what we learn from meditation, the cultivation of a sense of spaciousness and egolessness, to the nuts and bolts of our daily routine.

George Harrison's Spiritual Quest

Some of the old  European veneration of the sun seems to continue in psychedelic-influenced rock lyrics.  In the past Persian Mithra, the Greek Phoibos Apollo (radiant Apollo), and Roman Sol invictus (unconquerable sun) were major solar deities worshiped in the classical world.  The Sixties seemed to resurrect these religions in another form.

Here is the other side of George: the Hare Krishna devotee.  This is what is termed a bhakti or devotional yoga, as opposed to other types, such as jnana yoga (path of knowledge, scholarship), karma yoga (path of action, service to others) and raja yoga (way of meditation).  There is a book out now called Working Class Mystic that chronicles his spiritual journey, I haven't read it, but it sounds reliable, the book is described here. 

The Beatles meet the Sitar

George Harrison actually without other Beatles, only Indian musicians, from 1967 Sgt. Pepper's album.  Nice Hindu-inspired mystical rant (if only they would change their ways, and do what I do!)  All in all though, not a bad message.

Truth in Advertising or Nanny State Psychosis?

Anyone who turns on their TV these days is soon inundated with hearing a detailed and seemingly never-ending list of the  nauseating side effects of advertised prescription drugs.  This is supposedly due to the FDA's truth-in-advertising requirements to present a balanced picture of the proffered product.  Behind the scenes of course are the rapacious trial lawyers who hope to capitalize on some missed symptom or legal detail to sue the hell out of the drug manufacturers.  Then of course we have all sorts of reality shows from The Dog Whisperer to Dual Survival with their "don't try this at home" or "without the help of a professional" warnings to protect them from those human sharks known as trial lawyers. 

What this really amounts to is a farce and paying homage to nanny state rules instead of using common sense.  Of course if one sees a drug advertised on TV, one has to ask one's doctor for a prescription, and that is where one should learn about side effects.  Every medicine and drug that ever existed has side effects, what is the big deal?  As far as adventure or reality shows demonstrating some obviously dangerous stunt or ordeal, no one with half a brain can claim they did not realize the activity was dangerous, and yes, kiddies, life itself is dangerous, let's just use some common sense and get on with it. 

There is a website that satirizes this sort of side effect descriptions here.  Another site that specializes  in listing outrageous nanny state policies such as San Francisco's ban of  free McDonald's Happy Meal toys, is here.  Another list is here.  I'm afraid we may be headed the way of Great? Britain where the right of self defense has evaporated in the rush to protect the criminals from bodily harm when they are in the act of committing a crime.  Here is one example of what has transpired there.  Apparently things have gone so far in the nutty nanny state direction that some legal authorities are trying to return to a reasonable interpretation of the law.  

The riots that England experienced a while back were out of control because everyone except a few Turk or Pakistani immigrants knew it was against the law to offer resistance to people who entered their neighborhoods to break, steal and set fire to everything.  In fact in one instance when a policeman took action during a melee it was to attempt to arrest an immigrant who had successfully beaten off some rioters in his street.  Luckily he was pulled away from the cop by his friends.  Meanwhile it was normal for other cops to just look on at the rioters without moving a muscle.   You can't even defend yourself with a letter opener or brandish anything that could be used as a weapon to ward off would-be thieves or assailants. 

A Trip to Bulgaria

From It's a Beautiful Day album, pretty spacey music, lot of violin, title is said to be a mistake by the manager, actually should have been "Love for You."

Balinese Masks

Balinese art was influenced by Hinduism and Javanese art, it is often forgotten Java was Buddhist at one point, and the Borobudur monument was created there in the shape of a huge mandala:

More Moody Blues

From Lost Chord album in 1968, playful lyrics, video graphics very cuddly.  It reminds us how big a deal exploration was in previous centuries before anyplace on Earth could be photographed from space and one could zoom into anyplace on the planet with the Google Earth app.  Apparently this technology was originally funded by the CIA, just as the Internet helped get its start from Department of Defense funding. 

It is strange that the book that inspired the English to further explorations was Richard Hakluyt's The Principall Navigations, Voiages, and Discoveries of the English Nation, published in 1589, was chock full of baleful tales of shipwrecked sailors, cannibal-infested islands, sickened crew members, starving and sunburnt in windless latitudes, dying of thirst, tortured and killed by natives,  and so forth.  Yet his book inspired a great many to take to the mast and seek their fortune in foreign lands.  Thus we may conclude that the condition of daily life in England at the time was fairly miserable and visions of gold and glory overseas were enough to motivate a great many.

Walking Meditation

Many people are afraid of trying the sitting practice of meditation because they think prolonged sitting will be physically painful, not to mention boring.  They should be relieved to know that Buddhist practice sessions are punctuated with what is termed walking meditation, in which one walks slowly at a steady pace around the sitting cushions of the room.  This helps us stretch our legs obviously, but also provides a different mental perspective, in which, instead of focusing on the breath while sitting, we instead feel our feet lifting and stepping, first the heel comes down, then the foot is flat on the ground, then the toes come in contact with the earth as we take another step.  

During this process we keep our hands together usually with the left in a fist covered by the right held against our waist, and as we walk we just observe the space around us in a sort of neutral way, not analyzing it or relishing it, just pure observation.  One can take a break from the sitting position every twenty minutes or so, walking five to ten minutes, then returning to the cushion to sit in a cross-legged fashion.  We don't have to attempt what is called a full or half lotus position with our feet pulled up on top of each thigh, just a simple "Indian" style of crossing our legs in front of us, while sitting up on some sort of hard cushion, will be comfortable.  

It is curious to know that the Stoics got their name from the place where they walked up and down during their teaching, at the Stoa Poikile or painted porch in Athens.  Aristotle also had taught while walking about the Lyceum, thus his school became known as the peripatetic philosophers.   While it is true and also unfortunate that the Stoics never developed a sitting meditation tradition, they did practice recollection of past actions at the end of the day, in order to evaluate and see clearly how much they were really adhering to their lofty Stoic ideals.  

More Wheels

Cream's Wheels of Fire album, 1968, featuring the eerie White Room cut, notice the wah-wah pedal again as in Brave Ulysses.   Quite a good interpretation of White Room here.  Others have interpreted it as having to do with seeing one's lover off at a train station, in stream of consciousness style, others as having hidden drug meanings, another rather surprising one that it is about viewing a dead lover at a funeral parlor.   Someone has a great imagination. 

Cosmic Wheels

Finally decided to throw this one in here, graphics are so-so but better than I could do.  A little break from reading Cicero's speeches and bios of Roman generals.  The Romans would appreciate the astrological references in the song. 

The Roman Republic

Trying to sort through the chaotic maze of institutions that formed the Roman Republic up to its end with the civil war following Caesar's assassination, is not a task I  am finding easy.  Not only are there strange offices and institutions like the Centurial Assembly, the Tribal Assembly, the powerful Senate, tribunes, consules, procounsuls, censors, praetors, quaesters, aediles, patricians, equites and plebs, but all of these categories evolved and changed though the centuries in an ever-changing panorama of power politics. 

I am going through this self-imposed agony in order to unravel an historical question that I find keeps recurring every generation: that is, with regard to Julius Caesar, was he a good guy who cared for and sided with the common people against the autocracy of the Senators and aristocrats, or was he a bad guy who trampled the democratic traditions of the Republic in his quest for absolute power?  To answer such a question, of course one has to examine the nature of this supposed Republic and see how it functioned, both in theory and in real life.  Then one has to look at the period just previous to Caesar's career, for instance at the disturbances that occurred around the governance of the Gracchus brothers, and then the lives of Gaius Marius, Caesar's uncle, and seven-times consul,  who opposed the conservative faction, and finally Lucius Sulla, from whose name we get the word sullied, who reestablished in a bloodthirsty manner the authority of the aristocrats.  Not that Marius set a very good example himself in the way he treated suspected enemies. 

But as one can see, just to get a grip on the basic reality on the ground on which Caesar strode, one has to digest a lot of material and then try to make sense of it all, and decide which sources are more reliable than others, and which are useful as long as one takes into consideration that person's bias.   Anyway, this is the point at which I find myself, deeply immersed in the minutiae of a vast assembly of historical facts and fictions, not able to see any patterns or themes yet, much less make any evaluation of the main question.   But it is a worthwhile exercise, I believe, as this particular period in Western history has had many ramifications in later times, and so, to understand it gives one the ability to understand certain trends or ideologies that have shaped our own lives. 

Tibetan Ritual Music and Dancing

If you get bored, just jump ahead to the next act.  I always liked the deep sound of the long horns.

Owl Invasion

A few owl images.  The Greeks (Athenians at least) thought it a symbol of wisdom and put owls on their coins, since the owl was a favorite of Athena, the goddess of wisdom.  The Romans, being a more superstitious bunch, saw owls as foretellers of doom. 

Some Crazy Cajun Music

These guys are are in the same voodoo-inspired vein as Dr. John's old Zu Zu Mamou video, this one is more self-mocking and less creepy.  I guess this song Les flammes d'enfer, the Flames of Hell, goes back quite a ways, as there are many Cajun versions of it, as well as this French production:

This video could be called Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Band meets the Psychic Circus (from the Doctor Who episode The Greatest Show in the Galaxy.)

The Beatles in Role of Psychedelic Shamans

Tomorrow Never Knows - 1966

Turn off your mind, relax and float down stream,
It is not dying, it is not dying
Lay down all thought, surrender to the void,
Is it shining? Is it shining?
That you may see the meaning of within
It is being, it is being
Love is all and love is everyone
Is it knowing? Is it knowing?
That ignorance and hate may mourn the dead
It is believing, it is believing
But listen to the colour of your dreams
Is it not living, is it not living
Or play the game "Existence" to the end
Of the beginning, of the beginning