Thank you for flying, Aloha

With the sudden announcement of Aloha Airlines’ bankruptcy at the end of March, Hawaii lost its oldest airline (61 years) and Aloha’s employees lost their jobs (1,900 and counting). Not to make light of this event, but all the news coverage got me thinking about my own fictitious airline that I based on Aloha: Paradise Air.

When Grandma and Grandpa took us kids to Hawaii in the early 80s, we used to play a game whereby each of us would stake out a corner of our hotel room and set up shop. Todd, Andy, Jenny, and myself had each created a “business” that we’d operate to barter with the others for goods and services. Kid-o-nomics. (I think somebody had a carnival, which was fairly ambitious.)

My great idea was to provide transportation to and from all corners of the room on a fleet of paper airplanes I christened Paradise Air. I still happen to have one these planes (number 22, the “Mighy Mo”!), and here she is. I guess part of me always wanted to be a pilot.

Put up yer dukes

All the recent fuss about this ‘ultimate fighting’ club for kids in Missouri has me thinking about what I’d do if I were a parent. I don’t think punching someone in the nose is the best way to go about solving a problem, but there are cases where it’s warranted. Why, if Sister Superior Mary Benedict hadn’t taught Eddie Breen how to box, Tommy Smith would have continued to bully him and they never would have become best pals, right?

Truth be told, I’ve never been in a fight in my life. And I’ve always wondered about that. Sure, Todd and I got into some pretty good scraps when we were younger, but never with the intention of producing serious bodily injury to each other. I can’t help sometimes but think that I missed out on a rite of passage — it’s not as though I never found myself in a situation where blind rage and flailing fists would have produced a more satisfactory (albeit short-lived) outcome than shrinking away in humiliation, my usual tactic for self-preservation.

And it’s not like I never had the tools to deliver the goods, either. During my sophomore year in high school I studied Tae Kwan-do under Jim Langlas, one of the English teachers at Wheaton-Warrenville High School (now Wheaton-Warrenville South). I learned how to focus all forward energy into explosive punches, deflect oncoming blows, and deliver round-house kicks to lay out any challenger. This was powerful stuff for a skinny 14-year old, and I admit to entertaining fantasies of taking down some jerk-off with a single shot the solar plexis. (What kid hasn’t wanted to bust a kung-fu stance after being pushed to the ground — a warning to his aggressor that he’d just made a very grave error in judgment?) Yes, that would have been sweet. But of course it never happened.

Dr. Langlas taught us the physical skills we needed to defend ourselves but the core value of his training derived from a newfound sense inner strength: knowledge that bred confidence, yet came with responsibility. Think of it as swearing to use your power for good, not evil. And while there is something to be said for this, the fact I was never provoked into unleashing a lightning display of martial arts ass-kickery boils down more to the plain fact that I was just too scared (realistic?) rather than any verisimilitude of keeping my awesome destructiveness at bay because I was the “better man”. I knew I never stood a chance.

In the end I didn’t stick with Tae Kwon-do past my first green stripe. That summer Wheaton-Warrenville was moth-balled and the entire school was divvied up between Wheaton(s) Central and North. I became a Central Tiger and Mr. Langlas a North Falcon. (Boo! Hiss!) I suppose I could have continued my training at the center he ran in West Chicago, but I was never very comfortable with the practice, patterns, rank tests (I suffered from extreme performance anxiety) and all that, though I can see how the structure and personal discipline of it all would appeal to a lot of kids. All I did was go back to sparring with Todd in Ninja Protectors!

Which brings me back to ‘ultimate’ fighting. Now I’m no expert, but it’d be hard to sell me on the idea of sending your kid into a fighting pit with a kill-or-be-killed mentality. Yeah, yeah, yeah, they wear protective gear and whatnot, but what is the message being handed down from parent to child? That by wailing away as hard as you can — with intent to pummel your opponent — you may stand a chance of ‘winning’ and not being called a loser? How can this possibly translate to anything productive in later life? What can we learn about working and living together with other people by beating the shit out of them, because that’s all we know how to do? There’s standing up for yourself and there’s outright cowardly aggression.

To be fair, our parents gave us Socker Boppers one year for Christmas and Todd and I promptly proceeded to sock each other silly, but there was a key difference: while going at it, we were simultaneously laughing our heads off, socking and bopping like a couple of cartoon characters with those over-sized air pillows on our fists (remember how sweaty your hands would get inside?). It wasn’t quite the same as being tossed into a cock-fighting ring with Dad cheering you on from the sidelines.

I can only see this as parental fear and insecurity manifesting itself in yet another perverted childhood arena. To the beauty pageant moms we now add the ultimate fighting dads. I mean, come on. If your kid needs to blow off some steam he or she can lay into a punching bag or a pillow if need be. (Sports, anyone? Hello…?) At least with the martial arts, kids develop a sense of respect for themselves and others and learn that avoiding conflict in the first place is often where the battle is won. Even Eddie Breen fought solely on the grounds of self-defense, and only to the minimum extent that still allowed him to extend an olive branch to Tommy and gain his respect. Wiping the playground with him would only have destroyed Tommy’s reputation and created a monster, a life-long enemy. Gee, I feel as though I’m on the verge of making a deeper connection to something beyond childhood scrapping…

(Jim Langlas’ bio on his new web page. Good to see that he got his PhD but continued to teach in Wheaton public school system all the way up until last year. Come to think of it, Mr. Langlas wasn’t the only PhD teaching high school in Wheaton. I got one hell of an education growing up, which says a lot about the ability of school districts to attract and retain quality teachers.)

(Earlier web site with nice photo of Mr. Langlas — though I can’t believe he still looks that young! But you never know…)

Standin’ at the crossroads

Last weekend I went to the annual HITESOL (“high tee-sol”, the Hawaii chapter of Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages) conference, mainly to attend the jobs panel. Talk about a wake-up call. Sitting there amongst the other under-employed, we listened to reps from some of the major language programs in town recite the same bleak litany: $18/hr (classroom time, but what about prep?); no benefits; chance of part-time work available (dependent upon enrollment); send in your resume, we’ll keep it on file. The gathering felt like a transitionary, “back to work” program for the down-on-their-luck. It’s times like these that the reality of your situation sharpens into focus right quick. The epiphanic moment.

Plainly put, Honolulu suffers from a glut of ESL teachers. And it’s not hard to understand why: for reasons that may seem obvious (upon first consideration), not everyone who comes here in pursuit of a degree returns to their point of origin (myself included). You’d think this would make for an employer’s market, but with so many teachers shuttling from job-to-job with one eye constantly on the lookout for any opportunity, the labor pool is in such a state of flux that long-term planning is all but futile. (Just yesterday I was asked if I’ll be available to teach this July. Get back to me June 30th…)

There are a few coveted full-time teaching positions here, but snagging them often boils down to networking, being in the right place at the right time, and plain ol’ dumb luck, leading to one all-important question: is it really worth it? Do I love teaching so much that I’d be willing to chase down a few hours here and there for far less money than I could earn waiting tables or schlepping suitcases?

Of course I’m being facetious, but at some point — if you’re lucky — you reach a crossroads where it becomes necessary to choose which it is you’ll nurture: your passion or your pocketbook. The truly fortunate among us somehow manage both, while economic reality and family responsibility force others to worry about getting food on the table first. No dishonor in that. At the moment, however, I find myself in a curious position somewhere in between — about to face unemployment, yet due to that very fact, free to determine the arch and trajectory of my next endeavor. And while I still have a bit of wiggle room before things become dire (which is itself relative), I need to be honest and ask myself if full-time teaching is where my talents and interests truly lie. I’ve known some fantastic teachers over the years; I just don’t think I’m one of them. As I’m fond of telling people, I’m not very efficient when it comes to putting a class together: whether it’s a warm-up activity or an entire lesson, I spend way more time on preparation than is feasible and in the end I’m rarely satisfied with the result. That’s no way to go through life, especially if you have a chance to do something about it.

Don’t get me wrong: I really do love the creative challenge and interaction that teaching presents. That said — and in the interest of full disclosure — I should mention that I’ve been teaching on a reduced schedule over the past several years. (The balance of my time going towards tech / curriculum / admin duties.) Having the luxury of time to invest in developing a single class each term has been wonderful. However, I’m afraid that full-time teaching would result in more harried preparation, stress, and reduced overall-enjoyment on my part, which would surely manifest itself in the classroom. I had a taste of this recently and it wasn’t ideal, let me tell you.

One option would be to continue on to a Ph.D. Not too long ago, Brian landed a sweet job in Nagoya, Japan (with a much more favorable salary-to-teaching hours ratio than you could ever secure with an M.A.). My hat’s off to him, but I don’t think I could pursue another degree at this point in time in good faith. (I’m having a hard enough time as it is finishing up my current program.) The original plan four years ago was to return to Japan and teach at the university level, but now I’d have to reexamine any motivation for wanting to do so. A lot of people, it seems, end up teaching English under the oddest of circumstances — again, myself included — and accrue a kind of momentum that becomes harder to shake off the longer you stay in the profession.

Plus — and I hate to say this — I’ve just eclipsed the maximum “preferred age” for most university teaching positions in Japan (I won’t go into detail about why that is… We’re talking about Japan, after all). But I’m not going to use that as an excuse to feel sorry for myself. I don’t think I’d actually be very happy teaching in Japan; even at the university level, contracts tend to be short-term so there’s always going to be anxiety over where the next opportunity for work will be. And, the last I heard, I’m not the only one with a career in this marriage.

(As an aside, I was recently asked to return to Kurume — as an ALT [assistant language teacher] at a senior high school, no less; I had to think carefully about how to tactfully turn down the invitation. I’m not saying I’m above that kind of work anymore, but it wouldn’t be long before I’d be pulling my hair out trying to re-direct such a misguided approach to English-language education from within. No, I think I can be much more effective from outside the system.)

After the jobs session had wrapped up, I changed back into my cycling togs and started for home with a lot on my mind. I thought a ride up and around the Tantalus / Round Top loop might do me some good so I dropped off my stuff at the apartment and filled up on water before heading back out.

Right where the road forks, at Baker Park, there was a group of kids playing touch football. It was really weird because as I rolled past, settling in for the climb ahead, the ball was snapped yet not one among them said a word; all I heard was the skiffing of bare feet on the drying grass. It was a great sound, full of promise and good memories. Just what I needed.

Good-bye P-House

On Sunday, February 17, Birmingham’s grand dame —the Parliament House hotel — was demolished to make way for the future. Opening its doors for the first time during the strife of mid-60’s “Bombingham” Alabama, the Parliament House represented new hope and became the hip hang-out spot. Anybody who was anybody passing through town stayed at the P-House, myself included.

My connection to the place can be traced directly to Case, who worked there for a time as night auditor while attending UAB in the early ’90s. Because of the hotel’s toll-free 800 line, Case and I spent many a late-night hour on the phone together. So yeah, I have a bit of a soft spot for the old gal.

(Case, what the hell is going on here? First they sink the Deyo and now the P-House exists only on Google Earth’s outdated satellite photos. Talk about erasing your past…)

(History of the hotel)
(Parliament House demolition photos)
(local news story)
(implosion video)
(Birmingham library digital collection)
(photo of Casey working at the P-House)

Hawaii loves a local boy

Hawaii held its Democratic caucus last night and news reports site a turnout of over 37,000 participants (compared to 4,000 and 1,200 for the previous two caucuses, respectively). So many showed up that voters were forced to indicate their candidate of choice on blank slips of paper — first writing down all names, then crossing out those that did not make the cut. Senator Dan Inouye says he can’t recall people getting this excited about a political matter since the 1959 referendum on statehood.

(Obama — who went to high school not far from where we live — won handily.)

The Police come to Honolulu

Concert ticket (plus surcharges): $114
Concert t-shirt: $35
Beer: $7 x ?
Chance to see The Police in concert for the first (and most likely last) time in my life?: a hell of a lot!

Last Saturday Adam and I went to The Police concert here in Honolulu. I almost didn’t go because of the absurd price of tickets, but we don’t get many big name acts out here so you take what you can get; and besides, it’s The Police! I never saw them back in their heyday and I simply couldn’t justify not seeing them. Sting said the last time they played the Blaisdell was back in 1981. (They toured here in ‘84 in support of Synchronicity, but I’ll bet they played Aloha Stadium for that one.) Plus, Honolulu is the final stop for this reunion tour that’s been on the road since last May.

(On a side note: Adam and I were both trying to remember the last big-time concert we’d each been to. The nearest I can remember is perhaps the H.O.R.D.E. Festival at the Shoreline Amphitheater in ‘97 or ‘98? I remember seeing Ben Folds Five, the highlight for me.)

The boys have all grown older (which was true of the crowd, as well) and the songs were a bit mellower, but their musicianship was still tight as ever. Plus, the Blaisdell Center only seats about 10,000, so there really wasn’t a bad seat in the house. Adam and I sat through the first half but spent much of the second hour on our feet, circling around the mid-level walkway. The cool thing there is we were able to walk right behind the stage, with the band maybe 20 yards away. (Can you imagine getting to check out Stewart Copeland’s drumming from that proximity? Hello!…) The security detail wasn’t down for loitering so we had to maintain a slow, measured shuffle, making at least 4 or 5 circumnavigations in the process.

Here’s the set list:

Message in a Bottle
Synchronicity II
Walking On The Moon
Voices Inside My Head
When The World Is Running Down
Don’t Stand So Close To Me
Driven To Tears
Hole In My Life
Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic
Wrapped Around Your Finger
De Do Do Do De Da Da Da
Invisible Sun
Can’t Stand Losing You
Roxanne
King Of Pain
So Lonely
Every Breath You Take
Next To You

Of note:

Fiction Plane (the opening act, featuring Sting’s son), were pretty good. The guy sounds just like his father, though I don’t know how much he’s trying to work that angle. Another Julian Lennon? He probably hates that criticism.

Ann, I was thinking of you often during the night. You and The Police will always go hand-in-hand in my mind (even though I developed my own relationship with their music years later).

And yes, during “Walking on the Moon” I sang as much of the lyrics to “Bussing in the Lounge” as I could remember. (John, I would have tipped a beer in your honor but I got a little ahead of myself when moving to let my neighbor pass by, accidentally knocking over the reserve I had stashed under my seat. I was thinking of you all the same.)

None of the t-shirts featured images of the band members today.

Though recording devices of any type were strictly prohibited, I’ll bet half the audience at any given time were staring at their cell phones instead of the stage. (While a good proportion of the remainder took in the jumbotron rather than squinted to see Sting…) For the time being, there are still quite a few videos posted on YouTube from the show that we saw. Just do a search for police concert honolulu.

(Honolulu Advertiser concert review)

(KameraKozo’s photos from the concert)

In Germany: “not a big deal”

Earlier this month, Harry Richard Landis, one of the last two surviving American veterans of World War I, passed away in Florida. (Nate, thanks for reminding me of this.) I know it’s rather grim to track these sort of things, but I also see them as cultural milestones. And, for a few minutes, I don’t mind reading and thinking about the Great War, the suffering endured by so many, and the effect of its outcome on much of today’s geopolitical strife.

When I heard the news I recalled an earlier story about the passing (on January 1st) of the last-known German veteran of the War To End All Wars, Erich Kaestner (pictured). I found this equally fascinating, if not more so, due to the fact that Kaestner’s death was kept rather quiet in the German press. (It wasn’t even reported until weeks after the fact.) As Der Speigel observed, “the German public was within a hair’s breadth of never learning of the end of an era.” No thanks to the German Defense ministry, either, which doesn’t maintain records on World War I veterans.

Even Kaestner’s family didn’t make much fuss over their father’s latent notoriety. It seems they would have been happy to forget the whole matter — if only were it not for those pesky requests from Americas seeking an autograph. (Kaestner didn’t reciprocate.) Son Peter reflects on the matter thusly: “In Germany, in this respect, these things are kept quiet — they’re not a big deal.”

(Link to Harry Richard Landis article)

(Link to Erich Kaestner article)

Please, do NOT save Ferris

(First off, if you like Ferris Bueller’s Day Off or keep a special place for it in your heart, don’t take personally what I’m about to say.)

Oh my god, does this movie suck.

I don’t know what inspired me to request it from the library in the first place. (Perhaps it’s the fog of 80’s nostalgia I’ve been trying to negotiate my way out of after watching the entire run of Freaks and Geeks over Christmas vacation.)

I should have known better, too, since I remember not liking the movie back in The Day. Which is odd, too, since in 1986 Ferris had everything going for it that I should have identified with: suburban-Chicago kid in his last year of high school skirts the system to create his own adventure writ large and, in doing so, shows the adults it really is better to be 18, clever, carefree, immoderate, and iconoclastic — rather than submissively get in line to don the “square” mantle of adulthood without so much as a last stand. I mean, that was my life (only off by a year). So why didn’t I buy into it?

Probably because this movie sucks. (And it’s not that I just don’t get it, either, though I’m willing to reconsider. If anyone could forward me a critical review that elucidates some brilliant and subversive sub-text that I’m just not picking up on, please, by all means clue me in.)

Yumi and I suffered through the first 40 minutes before ejecting (both literally and figuratively). I can understand why Yumi didn’t connect, but I’d watched the movie in it’s entirety at one time and so had a history with it. Guess I’ve just outgrown the genre. Or, more likely, little that I identified with in 1986 has much relevance to my life these days. Duh.

While I was at it, I thought I’d also give Caddyshack a screening — seeing as how I’ve never watched it. (!) Fortunately I didn’t pay to see this movie in a theater because that would have been time and money out right out the window. That said, it was tough to watch — neigh, endure — in the background even as I busied myself with other things. At this rate I think I’ll forgo other “period” films in the same vein that somehow got by me. Porky’s, anyone? I think I’ll just stick with Turner Classics.

(By the way, this is why I don’t care to recommend films or books to other people. I know there are legions of Ferris fans out there — my cousin being one of them. For me, though, I know a film just isn’t working for me when all I can think about are the other things I could be doing instead of watching it.)

We’ve got your back: just don’t break it

You know, used to be a time when veterans who served their country could always count on the Veteran’s Administration for a few core services, should they need them: a home loan, burial services, and medical care. This last one is a biggie. Huge! Granted, the VA isn’t a great first choice for many — bureaucracy like you wouldn’t believe and tales of experimental surgery abound — but as a last resort you always knew you had somewhere to go.

Apparently (and I’m not the least bit surprised here) this policy has been “re-evaluated” during Bush II, the sequel. Having recently lost heath coverage myself, I went online last month and spent the better part of an hour filling out the requisite paperwork for getting back into the VA’s system. (Gone are the days where you could just waltz in bearing a Social Security card and get seen by a doctor.)

It wasn’t long after that I received a prompt reply welcoming me back to the fold as a member of Priority Group 8g, and that more information would be forthcoming. Everything was falling right into place. I wouldn’t be able to run to the doctor for any old ache or pain, but in the very least I wouldn’t bankrupt my family the next time a car runs me off the road into a ravine. This all seemed too good to be true.

Then the other shoe dropped. Just yesterday I opened a letter that regretfully informed me of a change instituted several years ago: as of January 17, 2003, the VA is no longer accepting “new higher income veterans for enrollment”. Golly. Higher income? Hot dog! Why didn’t somebody tell me sooner? I’ll bet for all of last year I didn’t bring home a penny over $15,000. And to think all this time I’ve been living the “higher income” high life. Who knew?

To the VA’s credit, though, they will consent to treat me should I ever become “catastrophically disabled” (and that doesn’t sound good, no matter how you spin it), but only if I pay the customary fees for services rendered. Now, I don’t know about you, but what is the last affordable catastrophe you can think of? The irony of all this is that I failed to enroll for VA medical care before the deadline, when the Japanese government just so happened to be looking after my well-being. Now that I’m back on American soil it’s back to the ol’ crap shoot. Let’s just hope I don’t get in any serious accidents before I find a job with benefits.

God, this next presidential election can’t come soon enough.

Cruising the carpeting

Staying on the subject of bikes, the past few nights the muffled trill of a bicycle bell has echoed outside our door as Richard — our neighbors’ 2-year old son — cruises up and down the hall (with Mayumi’s help) on his brand new, candy-apple red Schwinn. The realities of apartment living… Mayumi said it’s safer to ride inside the building than out on the street. Plus, if you’ve got to learn how to fall, taking a tumble on the carpeting is definitely the way to go.