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RE: Condemania
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estebanana
Posts: 9351
Joined: Oct. 16 2009
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 RE: Condemania (in reply to machopicasso)
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quote:
Larisa had a pretty rough time of it after moving with her mother from the Soviet Union to the USA at age 13. She was unhappy at Kwajalein, but to cheer herself up a bit, sometimes she would list its advantages. One was "No drive-by shootings."
When I first came to Japan we were eating dinner with Yuko's family sitting around the small formica table in the family room. Some kids a few doors down the street were lighting off firecrackers in anticipation of a festival the next day. The lit off a burst of "rounds" and I instinctively recoiled, ducked and was about to drag Yuko and everyone else to the floor. There were like what's up with with him? Nobody sad anything but they looked at Yuko. I realized that no guns were allowed in Japan and knew they must be kids and firecrackers.
I'm kind of used to it now, kids play with fireworks. The other day we went up to this beach a ten minute drive so we could cool our feet. It's called Wakimoto beach, it's a full two miles long on the list of Japan's hundred best beaches. The day for the guy renting paddle boards was going pretty slow, he was lighting firecrackers a tossing them off this rental platform to pass the time. I thought Ok this is fair trade I suppose. Those are not bullets and my car is not being stripped of it's catalytic converter in the parking lot.
I'm not as jumpy as when I first got here, but it made me realize how conditioned to was to seeing guns and gun fire in close urban settings. In Oakland I lived in was parts of West Oakland in an artists loft situation. Once inside the building you're basically ok, all you heard were pimps trying to beat up women a get the money they earned that night and occasionally a bullet would fly through a window on one side of the building, my side. Since my room was adjacent to the street and I heard everything going on the other people in the building appointed me as the first responder to beat downs on women and other stuff that needed intervention. I had a special inside line to the local precinct desk and down town dispatch for Oakland PD. The dispatchers knew who I was and were I lived. The OPD is controversial and overworked, but they did respond when I reported women getting beat up. Which happened weekly.
That does not happen in Akune even though it is a bit more lively than Kwaj. 
_____________________________
https://www.stephenfaulkguitars.com
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Sep. 21 2013 0:55:45
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BarkellWH
Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
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RE: Condemania (in reply to Richard Jernigan)
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Really, Richard, this will not do! In spite of having annoyed some of your fellow students in the class, you persist in your thinly veiled attempts to impress them, to the point of making some feel part of the unwashed masses. Now you describe in loving detail the hotel you stayed at in Madrid: the marble, the leather, the mahogany, and (gasp!) the white table cloths.
You must remember, Richard, that not all of your fellow students in the class have had the advantages you have had. Perhaps they cannot afford to take daily baths, as you do, making them feel unwashed. I want you to step up to the front of the class and write on the blackboard 100 times the following sentence.
"I will not make thinly veiled attempts to impress the unwashed masses."
There, that's a good boy. You will not have to remain for an hour after class in study hall.
Cheers,
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."
--Rudyard Kipling
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Date Sep. 21 2013 10:21:58
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Richard Jernigan
Posts: 3430
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
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RE: Condemania (in reply to Richard Jernigan)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Richard Jernigan
quote:
ORIGINAL: Ricardo
ok, hot young russian women love you, you travel the world and seen it all, got an arcangel canon, you got tons of cash to stay at top star hotels whenever you want, AND YOU ARE SO TALL you can see fancy art clearly despite the short peons in your way. ENOUGH IS ENOUGH RICHARD!!!! The veiled comments have to stop!
I can't win for losing. I didn't want people to think I was hogging the view. Sigh.  I give up. Why does everyone pick on me? What have I done to deserve this? It's a cold, cruel world.
Maybe if I buy a Conde....
RNJ
quote:
I enjoy your stories Richard. They have a nice structure, have historical value and consist of well spelled sentences.
Keep the stories coming
quote:
Richard:
For whatever is worth, your post are always enlightening to me. keep them coming.
I get to see parts of the world that I could only dream of visiting.
Thank you, Rmn and RTC. I'm glad to have amused you a little. I think Ricardo and Bill Barkell were both kidding--at least to some extent--when they took me to task. I certainly was when I replied to them.
And I hope Charles Vega understands that I was not making a thinly veiled attempt to impress when I mentioned the Hotel Emperador. When I first started staying there, it had clearly seen better days. I'm sure it would have been well within the budget of almost any American who could make it to Spain in the first place, given the relative strength of the dollar and the peseta.
As for my response, with the picture of the Palace Hotel and the rest--well, you could hardly say it was thinly veiled, could you? It was an illustration of what I might have done if I had originally set out to impress. Even if the Emperador has been spruced up since I last stayed there, the Palace would certainly have been a more impressive name to drop.
I have only this to say in my defense. In 1991 I was broke. I had been through a divorce. I was paying alimony. For a year, I paid child support for my 17-year old son. I put him through university, and my daughter through university and law school. I lived from month to month.
I didn't resent being broke. It wasn't the first time. I saw it as my own doing. But I understand that in the present state of things, a lot of people are broke because of the greed or ineptitude of others.
After 1991 things began to improve significantly.
When my mother passed away 17 years later in 2008, my brother and I each received a safe deposit box full of gold coins. It increased my net worth by only a few percent. It is all the money I have ever had from my family since I declared my independence 56 years ago, and it's all I ever will have.
All the rest I have earned on my own, legally. None of my friends or relatives seems to begrudge it. And I hope it is clear that I don't see my financial position as having any bearing whatsoever on my moral status, or on my estimation of others.
If I have offended anyone with my joking around, I assure you it was unintentional, and I apologize.
RNJ
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Sep. 22 2013 4:09:53
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BarkellWH
Posts: 3458
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
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RE: Condemania (in reply to Richard Jernigan)
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quote:
I think Ricardo and Bill Barkell were both kidding
Richard, you KNOW I was kidding. In fact, you may recall that I came to your immediate defense by noting that you no doubt knew more about the local color, culture, and people, than many of those who (in a fit of inverse snobbery!) touted the fact that, in contrast to you, they stayed in "small, family-owned establishments." And my Chiding you as if we were in a classroom and making you write on the blackboard 100 times, "I will not make thinly veiled attempts to impress the unwashed masses" was a parody, but I think you knew that.
Since "Condemania" has turned into one of those all-purpose threads (as often happens; remember "Black Hole Eats Sun"?), I am sitting at my computer at 7:30 AM Sunday morning, September 22, reflecting on the fact that the Autumnal Equinox occurs today at 4:44 PM (Eastern Daylight Time in the US). What it means to me is that the plane of the Earth's equator passes the center of the sun, and day and night are of equal duration.
For you Druids and assorted "New Agers," however, you may wish to don your loose-fitting white garments, repair to the nearest Neolithic structure; or if you live in Peru, Nazca Lines; or if you live on Easter Island, Moai; or if you live in Kansas, Crop Circle; or if you live in Sedona, Arizona, Vortex; and participate in circle dances, tossing flowers at some lovely maiden while waiting for the Harmonic Convergence to occur. I was assigned to Santiago, Chile in 1987 and remember reading about the worldwide "New Agers'" anticipation of a Harmonic Convergence. There were those sitting on so-called Vortices in Sedona. I think some are still sitting on their Vortex waiting, but they now have their Social Security checks delivered to them.
Cheers,
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white,
With the name of the late deceased,
And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here,
Who tried to hustle the East."
--Rudyard Kipling
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REPORT THIS POST AS INAPPROPRIATE |
Date Sep. 22 2013 11:50:47
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Richard Jernigan
Posts: 3430
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
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RE: Condemania (in reply to estebanana)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: I would like to stay at the Alphonso 13
I wouldn't. I still haven't made it to Seville for Semana Santa. The last time I started seriously to plan it, I thought, "OK, why don't we stay at the Alfonso XIII?" I went on their web page.
Of course, prices went up for Semana Santa. Way up. They wanted something like 15,000 Euros for the week for the cheapest room. And for a deposit, they wanted twice that-- something like 30,000 Euros. And if you cancelled the reservation for any reason at any time, even months in advance, they kept all 30,000 Euros.
No, thanks.
RNJ
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Date Sep. 22 2013 14:07:13
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