The Modern Synagogue of Exotic No-Escape

Algerian Women in their Apartments by Eugene Delacroix

I enter a conference/theatre hall in a resort hotel, similar to the Gaylord National Hotel conference center in Maryland. In one of the main halls there is an exotic Asian show, I can’t make it out exactly, but it seems to be a cross between Bollywood and Gamelan. It almost appears as if it were a community center for Philippines cultural activities [my step-dad told me about a non-profit organization who presented at the Gaylord National conference center about Philippine culture]. Suddenly I am walking with my wife, we head into another smaller hall, though it is still quite roomy, because there is a sign that there will be free dining. When we get into the hall, a video is playing with my wife’s original music in the background, we both nod in approval that the sound is good. Then, we find ourselves in the pews of a synagogue service. The man at the front is dressed in regular secular clothes, but is speaking somewhat in Hebrew sermon. A guy my age in front of us speaks up with dissent in an Americanized Hebrew accent and just as I wonder what I am doing there, I wake.

Thursday October 6, 2011

Vietnamese-American War Waste

Triumph of Death by Pieter the Elder Bruegel

On a bicycling tour in Vietnam, open dirt pathways, clear visions of jungle green, translucent blues above and the rich yet sporadic proximity to exotic life, all of a sudden off the bike and crouching low behind a large tree, there are helicopters and smoke trail missiles and bullets whirring through the air with a silent menace, the colors become subdued with a steamy incandescence, a warning boldness that brings out an undead fear in hiding, I look to my right and soldiers are behind another tree preparing a massive latrine, taking out what looks like seed pods of human waste, and at once, it seems to me to double as a mass grave...

Fri, May 27, 2011