花鳥風月: the beauties of nature

花鳥風月  literally means "flowers, birds, the wind and the Moon." In the Tang Imperial court of China, whence the Japanese picked up their penchant for such four-letter words (四字熟語）, nature appreciation was a big thing. After all, it was the early centuries of the Common Era and, in the absence of TV, internet and pachinko parlours, the only competitors to admiring the beauties of nature would be sex and, for the educated, books.

We rarely think this way, but for the most of us, everything around us, every single thing is man-made. Even trees in the park are planted there and the water in river is pollution-controlled and partly comes from sewage-processing plants. The nature on the other hand, is just-so. It happens there without anyone's apparent will, yet it organises itself into ridiculously complex ecosystems, as if by chance. Human intrusions upon that marvelous order are like encroachment on a beautiful, elaborate building by increasingly smart, malicious mould that leaves mostly toxic waste and destruction in its wake. Even such beautiful excuses for progress and development as some architecturally fascinating cities and towns, ultimately are festering ulcers on the body of our planet. A particularly poignant example of such  human activity is the Tokyo Olympics 2020 site next to which the largest ongoing man-made disaster, the Fukushima Nuclear Plant keeps dumping lethal radioactivity into the Pacific Ocean and East Japan's densely populated areas.

So, enjoy your 花鳥風月, while they are still around.

喜怒哀楽 - Human emotions, which ones are desirable?

喜怒哀楽 kidoairaku "joy, anger, sorrow, and pleasure".

Recently I attended a talk by an American anthropologist Melissa Caldwell, where, inter alia, she shared her observation that Russians consider experiencing the whole range of emotions from suffering to joy as natural for human beings, while for Americans being always happy is the desired objective.

For me, the latter has a lot to do with the technologies of the self of the Neo-Liberal subject: our life objective is assumed the be the relentless pursuit of happiness (a nod to the Founding Fathers), where we would strive for perfection in every aspect of our lives. It should be rather self-evident that such a unrealistic goal-posting is a recipe for disaster: if a basic acquaintance with how the human nervous system works (it naturally operates in up-ad-down cycles  and prolonged periods of either negative or positive stimulation wearing it out) is not enough, the 21st century's boom in anti-depressant consumption should confirm that the pressure to be always happy achieves exactly the opposite.  

浅からず深からず : interested but not involved

浅からず深からず - Asakarazu, fukakarazu.

Technically, this is not a four-letter compound, although it can be written as such, kango-style, 不浅不深 (please correct me, if necessary, I'm not big on kango).　I heard it some 20-odd years ago, when a Japanese girl I knew told me that the best way to keep relationships with people is "not too shallow, not too deep". Coming from a culture where it's all about emotional extremes, that came across cold and indifferent to me. Not any more though, as life experience has taught me that to enjoy earthlings the best, you ought to keep them at a healthy distance.

There's another Japanese saying to that effect: 附かず離れず　(tsukazu hanarezu), "no attachment, no detachment". It popped up in an interview I made with a 70-year-old Japanese man in Bangkok last winter. After meditating on the two above sayings as a kind of koan for a while, I had a minor epiphany, triggered by accidentally revisiting the famous talk Krishna gave Arjuna in the Bhagavad-Ghita: "Stay interested, but not involved. There's nothing about this world that is real." My own insight was that "interested" is exactly the Middle Path, my dear majjhima, between being indifferent and being too involved.

As usual, the truth is in the middle, just ask those mysterious, exotic and oh so wise Orientals. :-)

On power and respect: the change in Thai perception of Russia

The other day we went to a restaurant in Silom, Bangkok's business district.  At the end of the dinner, I got to chat with our waitress, who upon learning where I am from, started waxing on lyrically about what a great, strong and admirable leader Putin is and what a great rich country Russia is.
 

I am not quite used to Thais enthusing about anything Russian at all. When I lived in Bangkok in the late 1990s, Russia was a defeated Communist tyranny fighting a poor self-image, hyper-inflation  and a complete rehaul of its entire way of life in the midst of Yeltsin's lawlessness. I remember reading then an article in the Times of India to the effect that Russia, with its compromised economical and international clout, is now a poor cousin to ignore not an ally to side with. It sounded unpleasantly opportunistic, yet  it did, with unashamed honesty, describe the wide-spread perception of Russia at the time. In Thailand, Russians were the farang jon, 'poor Caucasians', stragely dressed and with little purchase power.

All that has changed with Putin dragging Russia out of the Hobbesian bellum omnium contra omnes that it was in the 1990s. Russia's estimated 5 billion dollar annual investment into Thailand and the influx of cavalierly spending Russian tourists seem to caus a sea change in Thais' ideas about the country. Besides such visible signs as the ubiquitous Russian-language signs and menus, the attitude has shifted too: neither any longer a feared Communist empire, nor a poor cousin of the farang world, Russia now seems to be admired mostly on the back of its economic resurrection.

Sinic vs. Indic through spiritual traditions

This piece's main thrust is by no means to promote yet another modernist dichotomy but there is a noteworthy distinction between yoga and Tai Chi/Qi Gong approaches, even if both work with the same energies in the same earthling's body, or, if you will, both are two different paths to the same summit. To make it clear from the start, I am not talking about modern Western adaptations of yoga for physical workouts, which are highly syncretic and are a totally different kettle of fish.

Firstly, quite a bit of time in yoga is spent sitting on the floor, while the Sinic martial arts keep you on your feet all the time. For me, that has to do with the type of personal eschatology each tradition adopts. The Indic way fells more about deeper digging into oneself until you discover there the Absolute and thus escape the physical world for good. The Sinic way is to harness the power of the Absolute and make it work in the physical world (cf. Mao's simile of how the stupid, the clever and the wise deal with wind). 

Secondly, in yoga a lot of exercises and definitely meditation is done with your eyes closed, while in Chinese martial arts your eyes are open and focused or, sometimes, semi-closed, and very rarely completely shut.

To what extent these two existential imperatives influence the modernisation paths of China and India is a moot point. Just like Weber's grossly misunderstood Protestant spirit is an important, yet one of a multitude of the factors behind the success of Western capitalism, there are a myriad of reasons why Chinese and Indian economies are the way they are now. Chinese and Indian middle classes are probably more similar in their aspiration for modernist success, than different. Yet, there is something manifesting behind what you see as you travel through the two countries, which helps make sense once you keep in mind the subtle differences between the approaches of the two cultural pinnacles, which are yoga and Tai Chi/Qi Gong. 

P. S. This piece was partly inspired by a conversation with a Japanese teacher of Tai Chi, who after living 20 years in Bangkok,  told me that ethnic Thais overwhelmingly prefer yoga and Sino-Thais mostly go for Tai Chi. 

井底之蛙: why frogs do not fly

Once they asked a frog who lived at the bottom of a well, 'Would you like to fly in the sky?'

'Why the fuck would I want to do that?' quoth the amphibian. 'Your sky is the size of a handkerchief!' 

井底之蛙 - jǐng dǐ zhī wā, "frog at the bottom of a well".

"In the sky full of people, only some want to fly, isn't that crazy?"

 

More articles like this: 四字熟語- ancient wisdom in four-letter maxims

弱肉強食: “survival of the fittest”

弱肉強食 (jakuniku kyōshoku)

Is Leben really a Kampf? Should we cull out the low-earners annually? Who will eat the strongest once they are too fat?

The proverbial “survival of the fittest”, the Neo-Liberal rallying cry meant to justify every minor and major dastardly policy, in Japanese sounds even juicier: “The weak are the meat for the strong”. That said, it’s no match for my Dad’s laconic French, ‘in life you either fuck or get fucked’.

More articles like this: 四字熟語- ancient wisdom in four-letter maxims