New York in June

I leave my stuffy smoking room at the Renaissance hotel (the only descent room available in New York under 600 bucks per night) and walk out onto the Times Square, which is already packed with tourists, and maneuver between numerous taxicabs towards Avenue of the Americas. 


The sun is beating through my sunglasses as I blindly make my way through the crowd of businessmen clad in smart black pinstriped suits talking or frantically typing on their phones.  A sea of stylish briefcases, designer purses, sunglasses, ties and shoes floods out surrounding architecture, mixing the air with the sweet smell of pastries, warm bus exhaust and loud taxi horns.  


Ah the Big Apple, clad in gray high scrapers  perversely covered with colorful billboards, flyers and giant advertisements, vast vestibules with strenuous security and metal detectors, gold leafed elevators, receptionists clad in a stylish dresses and matching Jimmy Choos, colorful art deco chairs,  attorneys, bankers, Oliver Peoples spectacles, cream colored business cards with raised lettering - all of this gives me a feeling of deja vu a la American Psycho.

To ward off boredom, I e-mail friends on my blackberry and make lunch plans with one of my transplanted New Yorker buddies.  Leaving skyscrapers behind, I track towards the Rockefeller Center, thinking about how much I miss walking in the big city.  I meet my friend among the group of tourists taking pictures of the fountains. Despite his protests, I make him sit on the bench in front of the fountains and snap my own picture.

We stop to look at the menus of two outdoorsy restaurants and decide to proceed downstairs to the hopping Rink Bar. We pick a small table under a shady umbrella right in front of the waterfall and order ice teas, vegetarian wrap and crab cakes. 


I watch New Yorkers as they eat their food. Other tourists look at me and mistake me for a native New Yorker. One woman even asks me where I bought my pinstriped suit. I tell her. She sighs "Oh!"

I breathe in the dry New York air and relax in a lounge chair, lulled by the sound of the waterfall. I cannot get enough of sitting outside and catching up with my friend and stay too long. I then run back to the Avenue of the Americas and walk into the deposition late, with my jacket slung across my shoulder and slight perspiration on my forehead. New York lawyers do not approve.  They raise their eyebrows. I smile and apologize. Then smile again.

Sitting at the long pinewood conference table, surrounded by stuffy lawyers rotating in thier comfy contemporary leather chairs, I start thinking about how much I enjoy visiting New York, taking in its grungy air, loud noise, old buildings, and stylish but smile-less people, and wonder if I could live here.

No, I could not. I am too spoiled by comfortable Houston living, cruising around in my air conditioned SUV right up to my air conditioned office building and house, being able to enroll my child in an affordable private school, swimming with her in my own private pool and relaxing in our huge backyard right in the heart of the city, just minutes away from work, shopping, restaurants, parents, friends. 

No, I definitely could not trade my lifestyle for busy New York. Yet, I love taking a small bite of the Big Apple without the inconvenience of actually living here.

Rome

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls

 Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skulls does not suffer from lack of action.  This Cold War combat flick is packed with gunfire, car chases, fist and sword fighting with the evil Russian commies. Those evil Russians - they always make the best villains! 

The main villain is brilliantly played by Cate Blanchett, who has no trouble embodying the role of a cold blooded Soviet agent with a heavy Russian accent.  Her Russian was good, but her comrades' Russian was even better (I have no doubt they were played by the native speakers). 

Harrison Ford is still charming as Indi.  His character is older, but just as witty and intelligent as the younger Jones.  Ford never loses his cool or his fear of snakes.

My daughter and I give it two thumbs up, and she adds: "those Russians really like shooting".

Pink Martini - "Hey Eugene"

Pink Martini album "Hey Eugene" continues where "Hang on Little Tomato" left off, taking listeners back to the age of innocent romance and nostalgia. Pink Martini mixes upbeat jazz with romantic retro, sprinkled with Japanese and Russian, resulting in a compilation worthy of any musical connoisseur. 

Each song on the album is performed in a different fashion, ranging from sultry samba tunes to more somber classical elements.  The lead singer, China Forbes, never ceases to amaze with her dazzling vocal chords and ability to sing flawlessly in English, French, Spanish, Arabic, Japanese and other languages. 


As with every other Pink Martini CD, I have my favorite song - the hypnotic Japanese-language track "Taya Tan."  

The Sex and the City - a film review

Although the film was not as tightly wound as the original TV series, it touched on more than just sex in the city.  Dealing with the many facets of love, the film exposed human emotions in a rather raw manner, showing that love is only peachy when you are Charlotte.

Charlotte is presented as the emblem of happiness throughout the film. In fact, she is so happy, she gets scared that something bad will happen to her because she witnesses too many bad things happening to her girlfriends. While starting on an upbeat note, the film dives deep into the mire of sadness and misery which Carrie, Samantha and Miranda have to face in a way that is entirely their own. Each of them deals with a set of trials and tribulations that is unique to her character and handles it in her own distinctive manner.

One of the themes explored by the film is a way in which women react to unexpected and unforeseen events. Deep shock is the common denominator, which leads all three to getting angry, hurt, and scared. They act out fast, without thinking straight, only to feel numb and dumb later.

The film also deals with selfishness and pride, which make the characters’ relationships fall apart in a most heart-wrenching way. Each woman has many redeeming qualities that outweigh her self-gratification scheme, yet each makes the man in her life suffer because of it. The catalyst to the happy ending is love, mingled with the ability to apologize and forgive. In the end, redemption rules the day and misery turns sweet (albeit in a slightly bitter way).

Despite the sad notes, this film was an enjoyable experience for an old fan like me. The intimate secrets of female bonding, fabulous fashion and grown-up sexuality are all there to make it fresh and entertaining.

I have chosen the following character quotes to sum it all up:

Samantha Jones: The good ones screw you, the bad ones screw you, and the rest don't know how to screw you.

Charlotte York: Because! Nobody gets everything they want!

Miranda Hobbes: The only two choices for women: witch and sexy kitten.

Carrie Bradshaw: It wasn't logic, it was love.

As always, I agree with Carrie - when it comes to love, logic and reason fail. And when it comes to reason and logic, love may not be enough. I would never marry anyone whom I loved madly because madly is psychotic and "in love" is temporary.

Rilke - "Letters to a Young Poet"

Reiner Maria Rilke's "Letters to a Young Poet" are beautifully written.  I found the book ispirational and wanted to share an excerpt here:

"Letter Four 
Worpswede, near Bremen 
July 16, 1903 

... 

Don't be confused by surfaces; in the depths everything becomes law. And those who live the mystery falsely and badly (and they are very many) lose it only for themselves and nevertheless pass it on like a sealed letter, without knowing it. And don't be puzzled by how many names there are and how complex each life seems. Perhaps above them all there is a great motherhood, in the form of a communal yearning. The beauty of the girl, a being who (as you so beautifully say) "has not yet achieved anything," is motherhood that has a presentiment of itself and begins to prepare, becomes anxious, yearns. And the mother's beauty is motherhood that serves, and in the old woman there is a great remembering. And in the man too there is motherhood, it seems to me, physical and mental; his engendering is also a kind of birthing, and it is birthing when he creates out of his innermost fullness. And perhaps the sexes are more akin than people think, and the great renewal of the world will perhaps consist in one phenomenon: that man and woman, freed from all mistaken feelings and aversions, will seek each other not as opposites but as brother and sister, as neighbors, and will unite as human beings, in order to bear in common, simply, earnestly, and patiently, the heavy sex that has been laid upon them. 

But everything that may someday be possible for many people, the solitary man can now, already, prepare and build with his own hands, which make fewer mistakes. Therefore, dear Sir, love your solitude and try to sing out with the pain it causes you. for those who are near you are far away, you write, and this shows that the space around you is beginning to grow vast. And if what is near you is far away, then your vastness is already among the stars and is very great; be happy about your growth, in which of course you can't take anyone with you, and be gentle with those who stay behind; be confident and calm in front of them and don't torment them with your doubts and don't frighten them with your faith or joy, which they wouldn't be able to comprehend. Seek out some simple and true feeling of what you have in common with them, which doesn't necessarily have to alter when you yourself change again and again; when you see them, love life in a form that is not your own and be indulgent toward those who are growing old, who are afraid of the aloneness that you trust. Avoid providing material for the drama that is always stretched tight between parents and children; it uses up much of the children's strength and wastes the love of the elders, which acts and warms even if it doesn't comprehend. Don't ask for any advice from them and don't expect any understanding; but believe in a love that is being stored up for you like and inheritance, and have faith that in this love there is a strength and a blessing so large that you can travel as far as you wish without having to step outside it. 

It is good that you will soon be entering a profession that will make you independent and will put you completely on your own, in every sense. Wait patiently to see whether your innermost life feels hemmed in by the form this profession imposes. I myself consider it a very difficult and very exacting one, since it is burdened with enormous conventions and leaves very little room for a personal interpretation of its duties. but your solitude will be a support and a home for you, even in the midst of very unfamiliar circumstances, and from it you will find all your paths. All my good wishes are ready to accompany you, and my faith is with you. 

Yours, 
Rainer Maria Rilke" 

Kill Bill Part I

Like Tarantino's previous films, Kill Bill -- Vol. 1 borrows many references and tricks from Japanese cinema. Entertaining but violent, this film contains little plot and even less character development. For lovers of eye candy in the form of sparkling villains, stunning landscapes, perfectly groomed Asians, and colorful animation, there is plenty to enjoy. 

When the dialogue begins to seriously lack in cleverness, the messy anime sequences distract  from excessive blood flow and severed limb counts. That said, the film is well worth watching for the sake of seeing the Bride equipped with the solemn defense of noble revenge.  


Uma Thurman is perfectly cast in the role of the Bride. She looks equally beautiful lying in a coma, being beaten, or fighting samurai in her skin tight “Bruce Lee” motorcycle suit.  With a slick sword in hand, her bright suit looks orange from the blood of two dozen Japanese heads.   Surrounded by darkness, lit only by an amber light from the restaurant windows, she faces Lucy Liu inside a Japanese garden.

Liu looks best in a perfectly white kimono and socks, stands on a perfectly white snow, with white snowflakes falling against her very white face, accented only by black eyes and  black hair.  

Tarantino's careful attention to stylistic detail results in an overall aesthetically pleasing spectacle.   Out of the kaleidoscope of colors,  the subtle midnight hues of samurai action stand out the most. Though picture perfect, this homage to the Asian action genre falls short of a cinematographic masterpiece.