Last Trip to Brooklyn Home

4-11-15 

“We have a mortgage commitment. Nandy will be contacting you to get an idea of when you can come in for the closing because I know you want to be here for it. Also if you need any help cleaning out please let me know. Hope to hear from you soon.” 

4-13-15 

     It was a bittersweet day yesterday writing an introduction, up the beautiful Han river, for a chapter on Emerson’s (and my) return to teaching at a New York City high school in the '90's. The Eurocentric Jewish/Italian cliques of mealy mouth know-it-alls, with put-downs and a heavy dose of Albanian anti-Semitic sturm und drang, made FDR D.O.A. for me. But to see zombies come alive, thanks to pay-me-off Daily News Hamil (his finger on the pulse of cadavers) on the stoop of fifty years of wasted classrooms was too much to bear; no school leadership team, no participatory unionism, no Sweatfree school, no teacher parking, and no multicultural festival for the bulk. The best thing about FDR was getting out of there early with sanity and a pension, thanks to "Penis" Spitzer. Instead of pretending everything is beautiful (as zombies do) and listening to Jay Black's out-of the coffin drek oratory, I get to make love to my wife in the comfort of our bed 12,000 miles away from the scene of the crime. The catharsis of writing semi-autobiographical It Won't Work sometimes invokes spirits from the past, proving it wasn't just a nightmare; it was real. Look at all the friends I made there in twenty-one years: Jimmy and Richard; period. Facebook photos and one-liners don't count. There are more FDR ESL alumni friends! All of the rumors of curses from Washington Cemetery next door may have been true after all.

4-14-15 

 On the patio in Taichung, I just finished a lox and cream cheese on bagel. I have to sit in the shade facing west on the patio to avoid the shining sun on me and the laptop.

     Catherine asked if I could come in for the closing before June. I replied that we could. Nandy e-mailed saying she got the title report and asked about a sidewalk violation. The city threatened to return on April 2 to see if I corrected the violation; I did re-fix the sidewalk before we left before Sandy and it looked good to me last summer. Nandy asked me to call. I will tonight. 

     I am not anxious to sell the house but I feel no connection to Brooklyn, not that I had the last ten years living there when FDR endeavors became fruitless and the neighborhood filled up with arrogant Ruskies. I am glad that all four of my children have chosen to live elsewhere; it gives me little reason to return after the house sale, maybe just a night in a hotel, a visit with Jimmy and Richard and a trip to a few of our favorite restaurant dinners. We'll rent a car at the airport and get away, north to see Jim Drieu and Selma, and then west to Pittsburgh before we hop to Portland and back to Taiwan. Leona only has the library friends that bind her to Brooklyn.

5-11-15 

     We're back in Brooklyn clearing the house. We have given away a number of items on the street from the house. The kitchen cabinets are empty of plates, pots, and pans, and so is the closet. There is a heavy wooden bed frame upstairs that Alberta abandoned that has to be brought down and outside. The basement backroom has to be cleared out while the basement itself is empty. There's Mom's old break-front to the stationary cabinet and a heavy wood chest of drawers. We put it out and people pick it up. 

 Most important news from yesterday was the "Urgent" e-mail I got to call Nandy: the closing is set for Catherine's Coldwell Banker office on Ave U for 11am this Thursday, May 16, 2015

This morning, 11:00am is the closing on our house sale.

      I will no longer straddle a continent and an ocean with both my feet in Taiwan, though Brooklyn, New York will always be my first hometown. Not one person, save Kathy Forman, Jimmy Kanakas, and Mark Kaplan remains here to welcome me "home" now with the prospect of Tom Keough joining the ranks. Three mishigas friends (Richard Singer, Banks, and Joanne) couldn't bring me up, and Sal couldn't walk five minutes from his home to say 'hello' nor could that fat-assed toad Sanchez find an excuse to leave her seat at FDR to meet me on equal ground. Aside from the restaurants, there is no heartfelt or vocational reason to stay here. Even Jim Drieu, par for the course, couldn't find a way to trip down to Brooklyn for a weekend day. I'm taking it all in stride. 

Lin Family Banquet - Tan-Zih Uncle's Home

4-8-15

      It is 56^o outside with a real feel of 46^o; too cool to have coffee on the patio. A tropical storm passed south of Taiwan and only brought rain to Southern Taiwan. The north is instituting rationing of water. The drought continues. Our rain barrel is empty

   On Sunday, Leona and I went to Tan-Tzu where there was a Lin family banquet. I met Leona’s uncle (father’s eldest brother) and his married children. There were two round tables in our private room with about twenty people and another table in another room with ten more relatives who came down from Taipei. They sat separately because they had to discuss serious business; one of the grand children was refusing to put his chop to a land sale near the Tse-Chi hospital. They need his signature. As a female, a married one, Leona is not entitled to any of the land or its value. Her father would benefit and pass the value to his son, Shih-Dong, and then his eldest son, Yun-Shen. Luckily, Leona has me and doesn’t need the tiny portion of land though it would be lucrative as the governments wants to extend the highway north there and the land sits right in its place

      After the banquet, we drove in Shih-Dong’s new Volvo 4x4 up the winding road out of Tan-Tzu, over the Han River, and turned left into the undeveloped flatland between it and the eastern mountains. It is land owned by Taiwan Sugar Corp. and Leona’s uncle still lives there with his wife and pays a minuscule rent for a classic but modified Taiwan mud-brick home. When they pass on, the land will be developed. The house is surrounded by passion fruit, lychee, logons, bananas, scented flowers, and other flora. It was the first time Leona had caught up with these family members since she left for college in Taipei in 1988 even though we have been living back in Taiwan for two and a half years. I spent most of the time there talking with Leona’s cousin, Eddie, who understands English, is married and works in Taipei. He now knows my life story concerning my interest in things Chinese and how I met and married his cousin. The info will filter through the grapevine and Leona’s fate is no longer a mystery to them.

      Twice during the banquet day Leona and I were assumed to be the owners of the Volvo 4x4. Inquirers were surprised that our transportation was a scooter and bicycle.

Jeou-Fen and Eslite Book Store, Taipei

Leona and I just got back from three days up north in and in Taipei; went to a place called Jeou-Fen, a former mining town on the mountainside with long tourist alleys. It was on a Thursday so most tourists hadn't gotten off of work or school yet; it's the only time to go travelling in Taiwan if you don't want to get trampled or in a traffic jam. The next day we had Passover Seder with a hundred Jews, mostly from Israel, and a rabbi from Hong Kong originally from Brooklyn. It was a nice dinner (tasted kosher, Leona said) and light on the prayers, thank God. Leona hooked up with two college friends for tea time chats. The only disappointment for me (besides having no sex) was finding the fourth floor music department of Eslite bookstore closed for renovation! I almost cried when I saw the escalators blocked. The bookstore, however, was open, one of the largest English selections in Taiwan. I spent around 2000NT-$64 on six books but got a discount. Here’s what I bought:

 Three Collins Classics: John Keats Selected Poems and Letters, Robinson Crusoe, by Daniel Defoe*, Arabian Nights, translated by Sir Richard Burton, an edition that I hope to exchange because I didn’t know doesn’t include three of the most famous tales (“Aladdin’s Lamp,” “Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves,” and “Sinbad the Sailor,” all supposedly added in the 1700’s by the French translator), 1421; The Year China Discovered the World, by Gavin Menzies, Destiny Disrupted; A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes, by Tamim Ansary, and Danube, by Claudio Magris, translated from the Italian by Patrick Creagh. (*I hope to exchange it as I already have a copy.) I am lucky to have the time to read but I can’t read more than an hour at a time or I get distracted. I can read in the morning up the river and in bed before going to sleep. The books I’ve been reading before bed, Marco Polo and Helen Keller; The Story of My Life, I’m both about half way through. They are dry and I can only read ten or so pages at a time. Meanwhile, I shot through Clapton; The Autobiography and am shooting through Jews Without Money, by Michael Gold. Jack Kerouac’s On the Road waits in the queue and I’m putting it back in the bookcase for when I’m ready.

      There are five books that I’ve finished reading and won’t be reading again. I want to donate them to Belling’s Deli and Bar where there is a small English lending library or even drop them in one of the city reading boxes; there’s one in front of Chung-Yo. They are: Forrest Gump, Around the World in Eighty Days, Of Mice and Men, Life of Pi, and Light in August.

Reaction to English Taiwan News Posting

2-16-15 

     The weather has been beautiful the past few days. I am sitting on the patio while writing this. I have resumed riding up the Han River after our return from Cambodia and extra nights in Tao-yuan and downtown Taichung. I am bringing one book with me to read again when, for a few weeks, I had started bringing two and even three; my attention was getting dilated. One book is enough to read. 

     There have been over one hundred fifty hits on the opinion piece in the few days since I wrote "Sacrificial Sunflower Fools" in taIWWan and posted to English Taiwan News blog. There have even been about seven people who commented including Michael Turton who called my piece "high comedy." Everyone who commented is not ready to volunteer to help organize workers into unions.

      One clown who commented on the piece mistook me for a "pan blue" blogger until Turton put him straight. One guy insulted the Wobblies and used fear of violence to condemn labor organizing. Another turkey said unions are good but the Sunflower protesters are, too. Of the fifty plus hits, not more than twenty went back to the "Stinking Kettle of Fish" opinion piece I referred to which named some in the DPP responsible for co-opting the movement. I don't plan to respond to any comments. No one wrote to me directly. Two people liked the post including the author of the blog.

      There’s some schmuck who claims he’s been in FAPA for years and didn’t like me writing, “FAPA wants to keep American influence strong in Taiwan; their lobbyists pander to congressmen and senators with a means to do so.” There’s also a fear monger named Les Sharp who feels the need to defend Sean who wasn’t at all being attacked. Courtney Donovan Smith, the creator of the Facebook page is sitting pretty. He’s no friend of the union, either; none of them are, except for some guy Courtney knows called Red.  

78 Record Player

2-15-15 

 Leona got me a classic 1920's Victor crank 78 rpm record player yesterday on Valentine's Day. We got it at a brick-a-brac store on the Westside after we had had lunch at nearby Istanbul Turkish restaurant. I think she said they wanted $500 us with a 15% discount but I told her to offer $400; I don't know how much she paid. The proprietor of the store told her she had bought twenty models in India in various conditions and that parts were combined to create seven playing models. Ironically, I have no 78's to play in Taiwan; I discarded many 78's and gave others to Simone for safe keeping. The rest I gifted to Tiger, Leona's colleague at the library. I feel embarrassed to ask him for them back since I gifted them to him and he was glad to receive them. 

DPP Uses Youthful Protests

2-13-15

      I copied the paragraph in the last journal entry about the 119 fools in the so-called Sunflower Movement protests, meaningless protests that got nowhere and helped no one except the police who could fine-tune their reactions to the next useless student demonstration. I shouldn’t say “meaningless” protests. The protesters, encouraged and advised by certain clandestine agent provocateurs in the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) were the icing on the cake of Kuomintang defeat in the November 2014 elections. They did for the DPP youth vote what appointing washed up death metal egotist Freddy Lim “Youth Outreach Coordinator” couldn’t for Frank Shieh in the 2008 presidential election defeat to Ma Ying-Jeou. The DPP has learned to use the youth as sacrificial lambs for their own pro-American neo-liberal agenda. There is no “lesser of two evils” in a choice between Chinese and American power in Taiwan. The working people must have the power and there is only one way to get it: clandestinely through direct action in the workplace. After seventy-eight years of the United States de-facto colonization of Taiwan, a “Free China” free for only big business interests, and the same lack of democracy, though more transparently anti-union, Chinese power take-over is not the answer either, in the short-run. Until the youth of Taiwan get off their skinny asses and start educating, agitating, and organizing themselves into workers unions, wages in Taiwan will continue to tumble down to Mainland Chinese levels until working here or there is interchangeable in wages, already at the level it was in Taiwan sixteen years ago. A Chinese worker’s salary in some cities has already caught up to the Taiwan worker’s salary. For a family in Taiwan or China to survive, fighting for independent union rights is the only way out. 

Passover in Taipei

I got an e-mail Feb. 4 from Rabbi Shlomi in Taipei. Here’s what he wrote:

 I was reading your blog (which is a very interesting and well written if I may add) after searching for something else in the Internet (you know how it works...)I wanted to ask: are you still in Taichung? Would love to connect if you have time.  Hoping to hear from you back...

Hi Rabbi: I am retired in Taichung with my wife. We regret not meeting you when you came down on the Hanukkah holidays; maybe next time you're in town, we can get together. Be well, David

Thanks so much for your reply! I would love to meet with you next time I’m in town! What’s your phone number? Will give you a call when I know when I’m coming. Looking forward to hearing back from you…

Hi Rabbi: Send me an e-mail when you're planning to come. Be well. David

           I am not ready for phone conversations with a rabbi. Religious people are generally too conservative and bigoted for me to like. Dr. Rabbi Einhorn, who is 93 and still living in Taipei, was an exception. He helped me a lot with my family and then condoning my separation with the kids from my ex. The first question I would ask Rabbi Shlomi would be about him. 

3-16-15 

     I would like to go the Passover Seder in Taipei on Friday April 3rd. The dinner would cost 1,200NT for one person but I would also have to spend $50us to get to Taipei and back by HSR. Leona doesn't even want me to invite Joe Cooperman and family over here for a Seder. Leona is shy to meet new people. It doesn't bother me. I can go by myself as I did to synagogue in Brooklyn every year for Rosh Hashanah but that was something you do alone, anyway with the women segregated in the conservative temple and no talking inside (like anyone followed the rules.) We always celebrated Passover at home with the children, even the minimal ceremony. Leona was fine with that and even contributed to cooking. I bring it up again because I received an e-mail reminder this morning. I will be regretful if I don't go. I will ask Leona again when she is fully awake, when I get back from Mandarin tutoring. I don't want to get angry with her because of it. If she agrees to let me make a Seder with the Coopermans here (even if they decline) I won't go to Taipei.

 Leona and I are going to Jeou-Fen the four-day weekend of April 3-7. That Friday is the Passover Seder in Taipei. During Hakka lunch yesterday, I suggested Leona and I attend it on the way to Jeou-Fen. She didn't disagree so it looks like we are going to the Seder. She couldn't argue with it or say I was becoming religious in my old age because we had celebrated Passover every year with the kids in Brooklyn. I am pleased she accepted my plan. 

4-5-15 

Leona and I just got back from three days up north in and in Taipei; went to a place called Jeou-Fen, a former mining town on the mountainside with long tourist alleys. It was on a Thursday so most tourists hadn't gotten off of work or school yet; it's the only time to go travelling in Taiwan if you don't want to get trampled or in a traffic jam. The next day we had Passover Seder with a hundred Jews, mostly from Israel, and a rabbi from Hong Kong originally from Brooklyn. It was a nice dinner (tasted kosher, Leona said) and light on the prayers, thank God.