Cogito, Ergo Sumana for 2001 June

# 01 Jun 2001, 09:32AM GMT+5:30: It's brainwane-o Bandito, the Bandit brainwane: What else is there to do in Stockton, California, but write diary entries and emails, delay learning more Russian, get scared at travel advisories, read the work of dead white guys, and complain about the heat?

Orwell, Lem, Wodehouse, Chekhov; Bless you. I've finished The Orwell Reader, I'm rereading some P.G. Wodehouse (Very Good, Jeeves! and the like), I'm about halfway through Stanislaw Lem's The Cyberiad, and I'm sampling Chekhov stories from
The Image of Chekhov
Forty Stories by Anton Chekhov
In the Order in Which They Were Written
Translated, With an Introduction by Robert Payne
"The Lady With the Pet Dog" is so relevant, and as clear and cold as a block of ice.

Chekhov can be really depressing. At least when George Orwell depresses me he also provides some tiny but explicit glimmer of hope. The Orwell excerpt about his schooldays from Such, Such Were the Joys reminds us, quite rightly, that modern-day teens have no monopoly on horrid school experiences and angst arising from them. Take that, Jon Katz!

I'm not sure whether Stanislaw Lem can be the Thomas Pynchon of fantasy in the same way that Neal Stephenson is the Thomas Pynchon of sci-fi, because maybe Thomas Pynchon is already the Thomas Pynchon of fantasy.

Star Trek: The Next (de)Generation. I'm watching old episodes from the beginning of second season, I think. Riker has a beard, but they still have the old uniforms, which I would call "stupid" only because they signify a lack of quality. How uneven in quality! Even within the same episode! "The Measure of a Man" was pretty good except that the JAG was a character written before TNG writers could reliably handle strong females (compare K'Eylahr, or however you spell the name of Worf's mate). "The Dauphin" was horrible except for some inspired banter between Riker and Guinan. "A Matter of Honor" seemed like an ad for exchange programs; I feel as though there should have been a ten-second ad for Interplanetary Study Abroad at the end, with Riker, the Benzite, the Klingon, and Wesley all giving a Mentos thumbs-up to the camera. Come to think of it, the quality of an episode from this period may have an inversely proportional relationship to the amount of screen time Wesley gets. Hmmm. This calls for the building of a wildly inaccurate metric!

Funny-names-department. I have an uncle Ramanujan who is a math professor. Or, as he would possibly say, a maths professor. That's great. Imagine if I had more relatives with appropriate trade names! Uncle Sophocles, the playwright. Aunt Marie, the physicist. Cousin Thomas, who doesn't believe anything you tell him.

Immunizations. I'm going to Russia in a bit, and the CDC and suchlike are very concerned to see that I don't die of, say, diphtheria, polio, or typhoid. These travel warnings (regarding diseases that the USA, for all intents and purposes, eradicated a generation back) really drive home the fact that Russia is a developing country. Nothing like "causes paralysis and death" to brighten up the packing of the suitcase and the bon-voyage party. Good thing I'm not intending to visit Vladivostok or any of the other far eastern cities, or else I'd really be worried about the currency of my Japanese encephalitis immunization.

Somehow I feel that "I am immunized and super-sized" should have the same tone as "Disco Stu does not advertise."

Heat. Expletive, it's hot. I'm in the agricultural breadbasket of California, and heat exhaustion may soon crop up on this brainwane's frame.

How hot is it? It's so hot, you'd think it's summer!

Hydration, importance of. Wherever you are, make sure you're drinking enough water. Whether it's summer or winter, you need a certain amount of the old H2 (O, that is!) to lubricate all those little biochemical ball bearings. When I remember to drink more water, my mood improves, I sleep better, and my food even kinda tastes better! Drink cool, refreshing water. Now with pretty much the same ppm level of arsenic!

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/1/213246/1768

Filed under: Reading

# 03 Jun 2001, 03:40AM: In a small golf pond, I'll be a big fish: So much fun yesterday! An all-day Fun Session with Leonard made Stockton more bearable, despite the fact that it was Expletive-Gerund Hot.

So we played miniature golf at Golfland. He beat me narrowly. We both went way above par. Perhaps the "medium" level was a bit too tough. I did, however, beat him handily, twice, at air hockey in the Golfland Arcade. (The air hockey tables there, quality-wise, are simply not as good as the sole air hocket table in the BearCade at Cal.)

Hey people, if you're going to play mini-golf, obey the rules that actually make sense, e.g., the four-people-to-a-party rule. It keeps things from getting backed up, and people don't have to wait for you, and so on. There was a group of about ten people in front of us -- or maybe it was only eight, but there were so many kids running around the group that I couldn't keep track. At least they stopped around hole 12 or 14 to go (I think) eat cake and such. Argh.

We also watched "Terror of Mechagodzilla." I now have seen the canonical mad-scientist who actually says "I'll destroy them all" and so on, and the alien overlord, and the beautiful scientist's daughter, and the evacuation of Tokyo, and -- of course -- the big Godzilla fight scene. Now I can make real knowing references, as opposed to fake knowing references. I will still, however, feel fake about it.

(Katsuhiko Sasaki, the star (well, aside from Godzilla and his fellow monsters) looks a lot like my friend Anirvan.)

I saw "American Desi" twice this weekend. I hesitate to call it "good," but I certainly enjoyed it a great deal. It's a terrific in-joke for American-born Indians such as me, just as I'm sure "Half-Baked" was a terrific in-joke for American-born stoners. I recommend it only for other American-born Indians, or perhaps for people who know American-born Indians well. The acting is good, the dialogue swings between inspired and functional, the characters have more depth than you expect at first, but the most appealing thing about the film is the sense of familiarity with my bicultural situation that I've never felt in any other film.

Why does the film's star, Deep Katdare, look so familiar? I say he looks like a guy in a Mentos Ad. My sister says he looks like Salman Khan (a Hindi film star). IMDB tells me that he was in an episode of "New York Undercover" seven years ago. OK, he just has those All-Indian-American "good" looks, then.

The villain is great. The character is named Rakesh, and he is such a great schemer! It's so fun to watch! You feel as though a "Mwa-ha-ha-ha" will escape at any moment, but of course he just smirks. Fantastic.

I'd rather be a really interesting villain who gets beat in the end than Student Pouring Ketchup, when it comes time to view the credits to life.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/3/154013/3929

# 04 Jun 2001, 02:26AM GMT+5:30: Milk, cheese, bread, diary: A tiny little litany of what I've done today.

I played mini-golf with Steve/holeburning, the second person in two days to drive down from the SanFran Bay Area to come see me in scenic Stockton. I beat him mostly because I had played the very same course the previous day. I also beat him at air hockey. I thought I had beat Leonard handily the previous day, but no. Steve didn't even make more than two points in each game (the game automatically ends when one player, namely brainwane, makes seven goals). I wonder whether I would whip him even better if the table worked the way it's supposed to. Tip: the puck should not ever stop hovering! Jeez.

We also walked around the University of the Pacific, which may be the only fun and free thing to do with someone in Stockton, aside from sitting at home talking.

Finished The Cyberiad, by Stanislaw Lem. Very good stuff. The puns are terrific, the two main characters are different when I was afraid that they'd just be the same, and the surprising sophistication of the philosophical dialogue unnerved and provoked me.

One of the things that amazes me most is how much work the translator must have done to create English puns that, presumably, carry the same flavor that Lem must have created in the original Polish.

To fluffy grue: I know that sometimes Segfault stinks -- hey, even now it's down -- but the geek humor site recently published one of my articles, so it can't be all bad.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/4/22647/37416

Filed under: Reading

# 04 Jun 2001, 10:01AM GMT+5:30: Dude, Where's My Activity?: Today -- not much. Shopped and otherwise prepared for the Russia trip, took a long nap, reread Go Jump in the Pool! by Gordon Korman, e-mailed a bit, read some of The Age of Kali by William Dalrymple, watched a bit of TV, ate, and talked on the phone with people. No mini-golf whatsoever. That's all.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/5/1153/34531

Filed under: Reading

# 06 Jun 2001, 02:08AM GMT+5:30: Girlfriend in a SoMa: Kurt Vonnegut, Bertrand Russell, Star Trek, Martin Gardner, The Smiths, Big Tobacco, Angel, Robert Browning.

So today I finished Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut. Sure, I also packed a great deal for the St. Petersburg trip, and I did housework for my mother, and I ate and talked on the phone and the suchlike, but the primary intellectual activity of my day has been reading -- that and some of Bertrand Russell's Marriage and Morals. (My dad recommended it as an insomnia remedy.)

First, Slaughterhouse-Five. I'd read some Vonnegut before, namely, "Harrison Bergeron" and Player Piano and Timequake. Vonnegut's brand of in-your-face, extremely purposeful absurdism strikes a chord with me -- and, apparently, with millions of other readers. His mainstream popularity makes me suspicious. (This contrarian (read: perverse) attitude is nothing new to those who know me.) But those stories are, indeed, enjoyable, and perhaps even good.

As you probably know (if you know anything at all about Vonnegut), Slaughterhouse-Five is one of his most famous works, if not the most famous. There exists a film version. ("Own" "it" "on" "DVD.") There may be merchandise -- little Tralfamadorians, little teapots, little Montana Wildhack dolls.

I found it extremely similar to Timequake. Lots of rumination on the foolish mortal preoccupation with free will, much Kilgore Trout and reflexive referencing. And I found it quite enjoyable. Yes, Vonnegut sticks much of his craft right in your face, telling you this is what I am doing here on a writerly level, isn't it silly? The insistent denial of subtlety, at times, is the point, no? (At least he doesn't clash symbols in your face as Nathaniel Hawthorne does.) But some of the craft -- such as his fractal detail ad absurdum in the stead of melodrama -- is more structural, more rewarding to ponder.

"There are almost no characters in this story, and almost no dramatic confrontations, because most of the people in it are so sick and so much the listless playthings of enormous forces."

I'm going to read more Vonnegut when I get back from Russia, if I have time. I'm thinking to start on Welcome to the Monkey House or to restart Cat's Cradle, which I began once upon a time. Any suggestions?

Ah, yes, the Bertrand Russell. Certainly any attempt to rationally review mores and laws regarding sex and love deserves its meed. My quick skim over Russell's waters suggests that he deserves the "reasonable" moniker. I am not sure that I agree with one of his premises: the purpose of marriage is to bear and raise children. If I were to accept that, then I would feel much differently than I would if I were to think, for example, that the purpose of marriage is not only to raise children, but to provide a stable and secure relationship within which two people can support each other as they develop and grow old. Wasn't it Blake? no, Browning:

Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be,
The last of life, for which the first was made:
Our times are in his hand
Who saith, "A whole I planned,
Youth shows but half; trust God: see all, nor be afraid!"

The Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The Royale" ran on the nightly TNG reruns today. In it, Captain Picard implies rather strongly that Fermat's Last Theorem, "800 years" after Fermat, has not been solved. The show was written and performed around 1988. Andrew Wiles solved the problem in the mid-1990s. Somehow this uplifts me, that the human race moved a bit faster than Gene Roddenberry and Mike Berman et al. planned.

Beginning Martin Gardner's Fads and Fallacies: In the Name of Science: The Curious Theories of Modern Pseudoscientists and the Strange, Amusing and Alarming Cults That Surround Them. A Study in Human Gullibility. I've read most of the intro, "In the Name of Science," but then I started skipping around a bit. I read a bit on Lawsonomy, and the whole chapter on Lysenko, because Leonard (note the temporary address) hath mentioned those fad-llacies to me. This is my first crack at Gardner's nonfiction; I've earlier read a short story by him about a maths professor who discovers a way to transport himself rather unusually by tying himself in a complicated knot. I think it was called "The N-Dimensional Professor" or something. I found it sort of dry, but then again, Mr. Medeiros in tenth-grade trigonomentry/analytical geometry killed a great deal of my love for math.

Anyway, I like Gardner so far. The dry wit reminds me of a line -- about the efficacy and predictive/explanatory power of witchcraft as compared to modern economics -- from John Kenneth Galbraith's The Affluent Society that made me laugh out loud for minutes on the ACE commuter train a few years back.

I'll take more of a crack at Gardner tomorrow.

Listened a few times through, though not thoroughly attentively, to Strangeways, Here We Come by The Smiths. Enjoyable, in a Belle-and-Sebastian-meets-The-Police sort of way. I'm not quite certain whether they are Good. Hey -- did Douglas Coupland pay homage to their song "Girlfriend in a Coma" with his book of the same title, or is it a coincidence? I'm pretty sure the book came after the song.

Some have remarked upon the crocodile? alligator? swamp-dwelling carnivore depicting Big Tobacco in recent television and billboard adverts by the state of California. Certain ads have compelled me to contribute to the discourse on this topic. The ads take thirty seconds and attempt to dissect the triple-feint PR strategy of the tobacco companies' ads.

"We never say the "c" word -- cigarettes. Oh, lots of beer, and cheese, and community spirit."
"And getting that big smokey brand name out there."

The California State Department of Public Health would have us believe that this is a colossal mind game; The Crocogator and the offscreen voice seem to be playing chess, with the public's hearts and minds at stake. I'm just thinking that most people are not that into the strategy here, and that these ads are effective only on a tiny niche of the audience, much like ads for Archer Daniels Midland (Leonard, as Jim Lehrer: "Mmm, that's some tasty grain!") or 3M (Steve: "OK, I'll buy a *lot* of tape").

Angel visited. Thank God! My third visit in four days. A pre-departure avalanche of affection. And we talked of important things, and I was glad. Coincidences: The first half hour of her visit coincided with the appearance of some Indian guy our family vaguely knows on "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" He lost ridiculously early. A discredit to the race.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/6/2815/19904

Filed under: Reading

# 07 Jun 2001, 01:53AM: Devotion Demotion: Thoughts from the Puja (Brunching style):

For the first time in my life, I'm seriously questioning the existence of God.
Is incense smoke carcinogenic? How much? More or less than cigarette or beedi smoke? Was it always like that, or has globalization made them worse?
Incantations and Other Stories, by Anjana Appachana, was a much better book than her novel Listening Now.

(By the way, "puja" or "pooja" is a South Indian word for "Hindu religious ceremony.")

Regarding the first item: I deeply respect the minds of at least two atheists whom I know. And if they're right, then I've been wrong for many, many years. I used to think that it's simply a matter of faith, which I have and they don't, case closed. And now a shard of doubt has entered the picture. I can see that all the explanations and premises and beliefs seem ridiculous and irrational to a nonbeliever. Why do I believe? It can't be enough that "I need God in my life to help me and to explain and guide me through difficult situations." I can't have a solely convenient belief.

I guess I'm having a crisis of faith.

Manual labor today! I beat a bunch of sofa cushions, kneaded dough and made dough balls for puri, and squeegee'd the windshield and back window of my parents' car. On the first two: I have heard people say that kneading dough and beating cushions are great cathartic activities, for stress relief. "Get out all that anger and frustration!" I didn't really feel angry at anyone, though. I imagine the Tick would say, "Take that, Communism! And that, evildoer!" And Judge John J. Justice: "I'm beating the injustice out of these pillows!" But I just focused on getting a lot of dust out of the cushions. I tried singing to make the time go by faster. I wish I knew more slave spirituals and union-organizing songs. All I know is a verse of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" and the refrain of "Whose Side Are You On?" And I sang "She'll Be Comin' 'Round the Mountain When She Comes" and "This Land is Your Land, This Land is My Land" -- the latter of which, I hear, used to be a leftist song, with verses about union-busting and the like, when Woody Guthrie first wrote it.

Anyway, I overdid it a little bit on the hitting of the cushions, and now I have sort of a proto-callus on one of my hands. Ow. We limp-wristed, lily-livered desk-job types sometimes need a reminder that we are all bodies. We're all, as I think Douglas Adams wrote, just ugly sacks of mostly water. If this callus didn't hurt so much, I'd treasure it even more.

A few weeks ago -- about a month -- I did a bunch of hot, sweaty, dirty manual labor for the first time in years. In the 80-90 degree F heat, I moved stuff, dug up dirty stuff from a garden, cleaned, moved more stuff, and didn't even want to wipe my face because my hands were so dirty. And then I got to shower for the first time in two or three days, and just sit on a couch and bask with the other person with whom I'd done all this. And it was so much joy.

My hands hurt and my brain reels.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/7/15355/28169

# 07 Jun 2001, 02:08AM: Recent Dreams: Odd dreams I've had somewhat recently, that I feel I should record somehow.

Around half a year ago, I had a dream that my mind was somehow, Timequake-style perhaps, transferred to the body of some kid entering first grade. I remember some sort of altercation with the Adults regarding using GNU/Linux on the computers in the school laboratory.
Perhaps a week ago, I had a weird dream involving spelunking with my friend Angel and discovering -- I kid you not -- a pyramid formed by petrified dead evil leprechauns. I pushed it a tiny bit and it fell into the abyss.

Also a very odd portion: I was inside a doctor's office and saw weird genitalia that subverted human anatomical norms.
Less than a week ago -- something involving the guy who played Larry Applegate on "Perfect Strangers," and also involving seeing again one of my elementary school teachers, who in reality encouraged me and gave me a computer game that edutained mathwise. In the dream, there was some necessity that I should take my "O-levels," even though I'm not in England.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/7/287/39242

# 08 Jun 2001, 02:06AM: Panic-p: My last night in Stockton. I'm (re)packing, trying to keep track of about sixteen different things-to-do in my head and on paper. I know that I *chose* to do this, that I'm the one who decided to go to Russia for a summer and study in St. Petersburg. And that seems to comfort me not a whit.

Got my favorite watch's battery replaced. It ticks away merrily now, marking the moments till my doom.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/8/2610/29773

# 08 Jun 2001, 12:01PM: Just had to record this: Me: Dad, I know there are a lot of things that you wish you'd done, but you can't just use us [his two children] to get them done for you through us.
Dad: Why not?
Me: Because we're different people, with different capabilities, different interests, different attitudes.
Dad: I want you both to get Ph.D.s.

And then there was the "what do you mean, you aren't sure you want to get a Ph.D.?" and so on. At least it only lasted through a short dinner.

That's all for now.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/8/0121/15391

# 09 Jun 2001, 07:17AM: Quick thoughts: Scared of new stuff, I am. Leaving soon for D.C., I am.

"I want a handbook" as to what The Rules are. I said that to Dad several times over the course of arguing with him in the last decade. I was a legal-rational kid even at the age of ten.

I had to use Windows for the past two weeks, and I really, really hated it.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/9/7177/42221

# 10 Jun 2001, 07:32AM: brainwane: The Journey Sort Of Begins:

So, in the past 30 hours or so, I left California, stopped in the St. Paul/Minneapolis airport, arrived in Washington, D.C., saw my first Spike Lee movie, and met three libertarians.

Thanks to my sister, to holeburning, and to Leonard for an enjoyable Last Night in California. Especially thanks to my sister for driving me to SFO at 4:30 in the morning.

In the Minneapolis/St. Paul airport, in the "Business Service Center," next to the FedEx box and the phones and jacks, stands a lottery ticket vending machin e.

It's really hard to tell that you're in a different city, or part of the country, for a really long time after getting off the plane. The airports all look alike, as do roads. The most disorienting thing was the license plates on the cars in the airport parking lot. "Wow! Someone drove all the way to California from Virginia! And another! And one from Maryland!...Oh."

Another disorientation: seeing signs that say, "Founded in x," where x is some year significantly before the California Gold Rush.

Reston I only know from The Hot Zone, and Fairfax only form sponsorship tags on National Public Radio.

At Blockbuster: "Dude, where's Dude, Where's My Car?"

Also at Blockbuster, it was decided that the current trend of using the prefix- adjective "American" to connote majesty and grandness and profundity and depth (there was a Slate or Salon piece about this a year ago or so) needs replacement. I suggest "The Big," as homage to "The Big" Chill and Easy and Score and so on. The Big Movie, The Big Beauty, The Big Psycho, The Big Pie.

My newest dear friend Will, who went to Oxford for grad school, on the English, says that they have specific stereotypes and prejudices re: all the other nat ionalities, as opposed to the American habit of painting all fur'nurs with the same wide brush.

English person: "So, Will, what do you Americans think of ... the French?"
Will: "We don't care! You're all the same to us!"

I had really good food, for the first time, originating in the cuisine of El Salvador. (What do you call it? Salvadorean? El Salvadoran?)

A number of us exchanged close-to-celebrity stories, sightings and unknowing interactions and the like. Mentioned were Newt Gingrich, Monica Lewinsky, one of the infamous Menendez brothers, Ted Turner, and Ken Starr.

Unfortunately, my snazzy EFF t-shirt (thanks, Seth!) did not impress my Cato-Institute-lovin' hosts nearly as much as I'd hoped.

I saw My First Spike Lee Movie (surprisingly, NOT a Fisher-Price toy!), Bamboozled. Very thought-provoking, if flawed and oscillating between sly and sledgehammer, subtlety-wise.

Any tips on off-the-beaten-path, geeky things to do/see in DC?

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/10/103258/258

# 10 Jun 2001, 10:46AM: Day of the Dead: Today I used the D.C. metro system for the first time, visited Arlington National Cemetery and the house where Abraham Lincoln died, and read "Surprise" by Martin Gardner. Among other things. More on Lincoln, Gardner, etc. in subsequent entries.

There are many compare-and-contrast points between Washington, D.C., and the SanFran Bay Area. SF feels more crowded and anarchic in its downtown; D.C., more architected (and rightly so!), more self-consciously open and majestic. D.C. has roundabouts (traffic circles), more so than SF. Pedestrians, I think, have it better in SF overall (less sprawl in downtown), but crossing streets might be better in D.C.

San Francisco and D.C. both have mass transit systems that are pretty much subways, but I find the D.C. Metro more confusing than the S.F. BART -- lines indicated by color and by destination, and unfamiliar signage in the stations. There are obelisks on each platform (instead of wall or ceiling-hanging signs) with the name of the station. I kept having to refocus my eyes when looking out a car window, from farsight to middlesight.

One way in which the Metro and BART are alike: big ads on the walls for stupid web sites. Today I saw one ad that realy got my goat. "Run your own web site? Why not perform your own brain surgery while you're at it?" I understand that in-house vs. outsourcing is actually an issue for many businesses, but brain surgery requires an institutional infrastructure that I think running a web site doesn't. Not quite.

I have an idea for a quiz, much in the style of Brunching Shuttlecocks' "Christian Metal Band or Star Trek episode?" quiz. It would be, "Sports Drink or E-Business Company?" Orbitz seems like a good candidate here, as does Eclipse.

So in the morning I saw Arlington National Cemetery. And I was overwhelmed. In the movie Fail-Safe, the President says, "What do we say to the dead?" And the Russian premier says that we must tell them that it will never happen again.

There are more than 260,000 people buried at Arlington (they say). There are so many graves. Everywhere. A mute tribute. And they are in all directions. I could not but turn my back on someone.

We cannot consecrate every piece of ground where someone has fallen, but what is the proper way to pay respect to the dead?

There are signs that explain that this is hallowed ground, that people should conduct themselves with dignity and solemnity. Joel says that such signs tell us what has happened in the past. And he's right. Maybe American tourists are worse than others. But I felt as though people should be more solemn than they were. I felt uncomfortable, even disapproving, when people laughed or gossiped or fussed over camera angles. But who am I to judge? The only people who have a right to mind, maybe, can't say anything, can't tell us how to respect them.

Does this cemetery glorify war? Could a patriot and a pacifist, to borrow Moxy Früvous's terms, equally use Arlington to say, "we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain" and "never again"?

These graves were all Americans. What about the other sides? France and Iraq, Spain and Nicaragua, England and Vietnam?

Man:(explains that the Guard at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier is "very focused," "ceremonial," and that he can't stray for a moment from his task and his precision.)
Boy:"So, what is it, exactly, for?"

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/10/224625/255

# 11 Jun 2001, 10:03AM: Diary For the Damned: I'm smelling East Coast smells. Takes me back to my childhood.

Not nearly enough -- proportional to what I want to say -- about Washington, D.C., day two of brainwane the Tourist.

On the Mall: How much neoclassical architecture does one city need?!

I mailed several postcards today.

Would you believe that there is a restaurant on Pennsylvania Avenue named Poli-Tiki? And there are all these weird very specific fusion restaurants. Italo-Austrian (Cafe Tinolo). Italo-Thai (Pad Roma or something). In California, we have very catholic fusion restaurants -- here, it's only two, two, two cuisines in one!

Today I tried to make sense of the connections among:

the Constitution/Bill of Rights/Declaration of Independence combo at the National Archives
Arlington National Cemetery
Timothy McVeigh's execution
The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum
Dawn by Elie Wiesel
The White House, and a protestor (against nukes) keeping vigil across the street in LaFayette Plaza

I will say more when I can. For now: I've been thinking a lot about the question of the proper way to honor the dead. And the differences between Arlington and the Holocaust Museum strike me deeply. One tries to shout; the other tries to be silent.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/11/22352/1176

# 14 Jun 2001, 10:00AM: To Russia With Like: I'm in a Kinko's (oi!) trying to write a diary entry in (checks watch) six minutes, before I go back to the hotel, and get on a plane to (what the hell am I doing?) St. Petersburg.

Who invented the footnote?

Someone in the orientation for my study-abroad program said that we should use "common sense," "your best defense." The idea of 'common sense' really disturbs me, because for a long time I was told by people very close to me that I had no such thing. They may have been right, but ever since then I can't really believe that I have it. What is it? Examples?

It's tough to be a vegetarian in DC.

Morton Kondracke wrote a book called Saving Milly. Blurbs from Katie Couric, Christopher Reeves, and Mary Tyler Moore on the back.

There is a Buca di Beppo in DC with the "Sanitary Bathrooms" line in its ad on the Metro.

I saw fireflies and smelled certain smells in the past week that I only recal from my childhood in Pennsylvania.

The new Amnesty International ads bother me, and I can't put a finger on the reason.

The Smithsonian has better toilet paper in its ladies' room than does the Arlington Hilton in Virginia.

The two Justice John Marshall Harlans (Supreme Court) both were "Great Dissenters." I'm imagining a Capitol Steps song to the tune of "The Great Pretender." "The Great Dissenter/Concurrence unknown..."

I got a copy of Good News Club v. Milford Central School when I visited the Supreme Court yesterday. Very seth-y.

More updates from Leningrad.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/14/10037/3737

# 16 Jun 2001, 12:30PM: Live from Leningrad, it's Saturday Morning: I can't believe it's not butter, and I can't believe I've been in Russia for almost a day.

So, what's to say? Lots of stuff. I have successfully:

Bought and eaten food and water (no guarantees on the safety and healthfulness of said food and water) (or on not being ripped off -- I think my breakfast was twice as expensive as listed because I'm an obvious foreigner)
Not had my passport stolen
Gotten here, into an Internet cafe, to conduct e-mail and weblog business
Made a far-too-expensive phone call to tell my mom that I'm all right
Escaped some gypsy children who wanted money, and a random Russian felllow who said "hi" in that troublesome way
Showered & used toilets
Walked a great deal along Nevskii Prospekt
Spoken in Russian (some)

I'm sure there's more. I completely failed yesterday at attempting to purchase a phone card at some International Telephone Office. My Russian stinks to heaven, but perhaps not to high heaven.

Right now I'm very happy to be here. I've had a few moments of depression, as in right after I had a complete communication breakdown when trying to buy that phone card. And I know that it would be better for me to be practicing my Russian right now, rather than thinking in English and/or talking with/hanging out with my fellow Americans. But I need a little time/space to think to myself, and I prefer this diary to do that.

Seems that Seth, Steve, Leonard, and Dan have all sort of randomly interacted recently. Huh.

The panopoly of incompatible phone-card systems in this city are, as Neal Stephenson wrote in Cryptonomicon (and about almost the same problem!), "a case study in why gradualism is bad."

I entered Washington, D.C. via Dulles Airport, and left it the same way. "Ashes to ashes, Dulles to Dulles."

Is "I Like Big Butts" (1980s rap song) an homage to that one song in This is Spinal Tap?

Tonight's Episode: A Bicycle Built for Death

I saw Antitrust on the plane. So earnest, so unintentionally hilarious. Actual "found-object" Tonight's Episode within Antitrust: Murdered for Code.

I saw it with The Other Geek (well, one of two, maybe) in my group. There were spots where it was dead-on, and probably much better than Swordfish is (haven't seen the latter) at being somewhat authentic to geekitude and the free-software zealot POV. The RMS figure was Asian, which gladdened me. And/but I'm not sure whether bandying about the phrase "open source" in connection with very ideological, "human knowledge belongs to the world" sloganeering is a good thing. Oh, and also, as far as we know, Microsoft is not akin to The Firm (cf. John Grisham). So the analogy has been dramatized, and thus it seems harder to reallly go after Gatesism, since Gates is not actually (again, AFAWK) sending paid thugs after innovative young hackers to steal their ideas.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/16/03037/2724

# 18 Jun 2001, 04:18AM: Ochen buistro -- very quick: I'm going to post more later today, but:

I'm glad that Steve, Seth, Leonard, my sister, and probably others got my postcards.
"You'd think that with armed traffic cops, they could make a dent in the problem." -- John on Nyevskii Prospekt (the main street in St. Petersburg)
When I hear "Trinity," I first think "nuclear test," not "Father, Son, and Holy Ghost."
"Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free software."
I've finished reading the US Supreme Court decision on Good News Club v. Milford Central School and the concurrences and dissents. It seems as though the definition of evangelism is a crucial issue. What is evangelism? Is it a viewpoint or a topic? Or is it both in some special way? The opinions made me think about my own thoughts on the subject, which, of course, makes me think that I need to read more law, and turn into Seth, and/or possibly make my parents happy by going to law school (a very, very, long shot).
I think that if you find a typo in a Supreme Court decision, you should get a free writ of certiorari.
Tonight's Episode: My Other Car is a Corpse
Perhaps it's time for Analog Divergence. The new new new economy. Two wrongs don't make a right; three wrongs get you back on the highway, as the saying goes.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/18/41848/1700

# 18 Jun 2001, 12:20PM: An American Desi in Leningrad: Even yet as quick! I will try and post a great deal tomorrow. As it is, if I take more than about five minutes on this, I'll be late home and my Russian host mother will get worried, and I'd rather not call (I think she's napping).

By the way, thanks for all your encouragement on posting my experiences here in the Russian city of St. Petersburg. I'm having lots of fun and lots of aching and lots of new experiences. I'm glad to share them with you.

Late Saturday night, I think it was -- yes, it must have been -- we took a boat ride through the canals and waterways that span the city. The main river is the Nyeva. It was magnificent. The moment when we came out of a canal into the huge bay was amazing. It's the Belli Nochi, the White Nights, remember? St. Petersburg is pretty far north, so right now we only get a little tiny bit of darkness.

When night is only half an hour
Kogda noch tolko pol-chasa
And I read and write without a lamp
Ee ya chitayoo ee peeshu byez lampa

I think it goes something like that. Pushkin. My host mother recited it to me. Gee, Russians really do love Pushkin.

When I saw the blue-black waves going past the boat (or the boat going past the waves?), I thought of perspective, and of relativity.

Intercept
Draw a line
To represent
Your plane and mine

The bridge on the river Nyeva went up to let boats pass, as it does every night during summer. The crowds celebrated. Champagne corks popped, and cheers bounced from bank to bank, and fireworks -- modest ones, now, this is twice a night for weeks that the bridges go up on the Nyeva -- lit up the twilight.

Originally published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/18/122038/153

# 19 Jun 2001, 10:18AM: I Take My Tea with Murder and Cream, Thanks: So here are some more observations, some less random than others, about my most recent experiences in St. Petersburg.

Maybe to understand Pushkin and Lenin is to understand St. Petersburg. They certainly have a lot of monuments scattered about. The metro system (subway) was once "The Lenin Metro In the Order of Lenin In the Name of Lenin" or something.
I hear American music and it just seems very odd. In the metro, the big TV playing ad loops has various American songs (e.g., IIRC, "Celebrity Skin" by Hole) as the background music to several ads. There's a "Liverpool Bar," off Nyevskii Prospekt, with pics of the Beatles over the door. I saw graffiti referring -- in English, in Latin characters! -- to Limp Bizkit and the X-Files. (Another member of my group saw "Porno Punk," with "Porno" in Cyrillic and "Punk" in Latin. (To signs such as that, including ads in which the big slogan has one word in English and one in Russian, John says, "Pick a character set and stick to it!))
Also overheard: 80s pop in the bus from the airport to the dorm; "Georgia on my Mind" and "A Kiss is [Still/Just] a Kiss" on the radio recently; and, this morning as I ate cheese and blinchiki and some mixed veggies, Eagle-Eye Cherry's "Save Tonight," which was pretty poignant. Probably the person of whom it raises the most memories isn't reading this.
Also seen: a kid riding across a canal, on Nyevskii Prospekt, on a Razor-style scooter.
During the boat ride Saturday night, I saw the first power station in St. Petersburg, as well as the building that the Dekabrists used as their headquarters.
The bit about the Dekabristsw reminded me: Some Russians got really patriotic with names for babies. I heard about a guy named Vilenin (V.I. Lenin, get it?) in a book called Russian Journal that I read almost a year ago. Today I found out about Russian children named Constitutsi, Perestroika, and --here's the connection -- Oktobrika, and such.
Perestroika is a feminine name, ending with a vowel like that. I could imagine a proud parent naming a male and female set of twins Glasnost and Perestroika, respectively. Oi.
I've been thinking about things I really need. Water, food, love, internet access.
There is so much in common between any sort of Russian national temperament and any sort of Indian national character. The hospitality, the food emphasis, the loyalty. I think there's more I can't articulate right now.
Except for the frequency of the trains (very high here! Something like every 3 minutes!), I generally prefer BART and the D.C. Metro to the Metro here in St. Petersburg. Ill-signed, a huge escalator ride up and down, crowded, unwieldy to get around, and all of St. Petersburg on the other escalator -- when you're going down and they're coming up on a Monday morning -- seems to be saying, "I'm like this even when I've had a cup of coffee. Screw you!"
Should "screw" and other sexual intercourse verbs take the dative or the accusative? Is "you" the direct object? Probably. "Yeb vas." Yep, accusative.
The poplar trees here give off little bits of cottony stuff. It blows all over at this time of year. It becomes a fire hazard, and sometimes people actually set balls of it on fire for "fun" (head-shaking), but it's very pretty. "Snyeg Lyetom." Summer Snow.
I really should try to arrange it so that I have large blocks of Russian-speaking/thinking time and a small block of English speaking/thinking time, so I don't have to make the mind-switch often.
I have to write about my harrowing search for a certain restaurant. This thing happened a few nights ago, and it's exactly the type of thing you will probably find amusing, so I'll write about it soon.
I might actually be acquiring some self-discipline, I wrote (at most) two days ago. Don't count on it, I say today.

First published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/19/101847/264

# 20 Jun 2001, 10:42AM: Deniable Plausibility: It's the ANSI Standard Deviation Cost of Living!

"ISO hate that joke."

Allow me to assume that you actually want to read about Touristka brainwane, living it up in Leningrad.

Today I went to the Necropolis and found a surprise: Euler's grave! Yes, Leonhard Euler (if I spelled it correctly) is buried in St. Petersburg. (Jon, our Resident Director, told me that Euler corresponded a great deal with Catherine the Great, and was invited to her palace.)

I also saw the graves of Rimsky-Korsakov, Dostoyevsky, Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky, Borodin, and at least one other that I'm forgetting. I kind of minded that Mussorgsky and Borodin (and maybe Rimsky-Korsakov) got music engraved on their memorial stones, but Euler didn't get any equations on his.

AT THE GEORGIAN RESTAURANT: Hung out and ate lyubo (?) with Rasa, Ross (who reminds me, in look-and-feel, of Seth!), John, Katya, and Greg. Discovered: When I want to go incognito ergo sumana, perhaps I will call myself Natasha von Chinglestick; and, there are a lot of animals whose names start with the letter "p."

Also: I was trying to think of what a person would look like if she tried to combine the Gypsy look with the Goth look. I concluded that Goths are the new Gypsies.

LUG meeting: The St. Petersburg Linux User Group meets on the last Wednesday of every month. I think I'll try to go to this next one, if only to meet Russians.

There is more to say. For example, A little Russian is a dangerous thing, but I can't decide what the second line would/should be. And I might try to find Mendeleev's grave and lay a copy of the Periodic Table and some roses on it. And I've had some very odd dreams lately, and I still need to write more about that cafe thing that happened the other night. Oh, and now I've been in three memorials-to-the-dead in about ten days (Arlington National Cemetery, the Holocaust Memorial, and the Necropolis), and that was certainly thought-provoking, in a compare-and-contrast way.

Certainly I appreciate all your encouragement and comments, and don't really feel homesick. Well, I've been a tiny bit under the weather....but that's another story.

First published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/20/104246/311

# 21 Jun 2001, 11:39AM: Choco Popov: Still in St. Petersburg, still writing. Since the weblogs I read have made no updates, I have more time to write. Whoopee.

Here are some comments I've made that you might find interesting, on the practicalities of my trip, my interest in Lenin and in Russian music, and on the exhausting effects of the classes.

I have now seen Choco Leibniz, non-Choco Leibniz, and -- yes, really -- candy of some sort packaged in some sort of merchandising hookup with the film From Dusk Till Dawn. Really. A black-and-red package, pictures of George Clooney and Quentin Tarantino, and some Russian words that really seemed like the translation of "From Dusk Till Dawn." I think it cost something like five rubles.

I did not venture to purchase said foodstuff. What could be inside?

Places to visit

Mendeleev's grave. Possibly to, as stated earlier, lay a periodic table and some flowers on it, if permitted.
Pavlov Museum. And, possibly, the street where he trained his dogs. I wouldn't have wanted to live there.
Rasputin Palace. Rah, Rah, Rasputin. Which reminds me that Boney M is still quite a presence among Russian music fans. I don't get it.
The Church of the Savior on the Spilled Blood. It's built with its altar directly on the spot where Tsar Alex. II was killed. I saw the outside of it the other day -- amazing. I need to go inside. Oh, and the reason it looked familiar was that a photo of it graces my copy of the Rough Guide to St. Petersburg. One author of this guide: Dan Richardson. That's funny.
The Women's Center. Just to see the cross-cultural, cross-racial, cross-gender barriers in action.
The Museum of Hygiene. I hear it's gruesome. Organs and people in jars, etc.
The LUG, as I've mentioned earlier in this diary.
A banya. Traditional Russian bathhouse. Like a sauna, only not. Very convivial, I hear. And separated by gender, so Mom, Dad, don't worry.
The Gas-Dynamics Laboratory Museum. It's all about Sputnik! Actually, maybe not actually Sputnik, but Sputnik-like stuff.
Lenfilm Studios. Maybe catch a free movie.
Kresty Prison. This is where poet Anna Akhmatova waited, along with hundreds of other women, for news of her loved one(s) during the purges. A stranger recognized her and asked her, "Can you describe this?" Akhmatova did, in Requiem. I really need to read that whole cycle.

There is air hockey at the arcade in Gostiny Dvor, an otherwise seemingly non-useful (to me) shopping center on Nyevskii Prospekt. This comforts me. Where air hockey goes, stable market capitalism will follow.

Another song snippet I have overheard in the Gostiny Dvor/Nyevskii Prospekt metro station is from "Blur" or "Fastball" or something somewhat recent. I recall it from ads for the film Starship Troopers.

In India, they say, "Delhi is far away." I have a feeling that, even in Moscow, people here say, "Moscow is far away." The private, sympathetic, hospitable Russian character is very different from the public, shoving Russian character. Home v. metro.

I think ACTR prevents war more than the UNA does, in general.

First published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/21/113942/286

# 22 Jun 2001, 10:33AM: brainwaneichka: Alexei, a friend and an unbelievably cool guy, is also an expat for the summer. In fact, about a week before I left Berkeley, I was in a car with him and his friend Nicole. She's now in Ireland, he's in Tokyo, and here I am in St. Petersburg. That link was his weblog -- go there, it's a nice contrast to mine. His is actually interesting.

I forgot one of the people whose graves I saw at the Alexander Nyevskii Monastery (which contains the Necropolis): Stravinsky.

Death
My lack of personal experience with death hampers me, both as a writer and as a human being. Yet, what kind of churl would I be to wish that a life would end for my benefit?

I suppose that's my lead-in to talking about the Kunstkammer. Tsar Nicholas had a Museum of Oddities. Today I saw it. I couldn't stand it for more than thirty seconds. Despite the joshing that my friends and I had done before going in, it wasn't funny to see babies and fetuses in jars. The tiny skeleton was pretty unsettling, too.

I didn't stay in there very long, but I think I was there long enough to judge that it was not meant as a memorial to the dead. (I had thought before going in, "Gee, maybe this is an example of how the Europeans are more enlightened than Americans about dealing with death, kind of like with sex and drugs." But no, it was just a carnival of freaks. For perverts, if I may judge, and use the term in an antiquated way.) So my count for the last month stays at four. I've visited the Alexander Nevskii Monastery's Necropolis, the Arlington National Cemetery, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, and the house where Abraham Lincoln died.

I've spoken earlier about my experience of Arlington. In its own way, the house where Lincoln died felt worse than Arlington. It was a forced, one-way excursion through the living rooms to the bedroom and eventually out onto the street. I felt very voyeuristic, and also very sad as I stood in the room, next to the bed where he died, and read the little card with his date and time of death. It was the day after I saw Bamboozled.

What if Lincoln had lived? I know I'm pulling a hypothetical that "Head of the Class..."

And more later.

First published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/22/103319/148

# 23 Jun 2001, 07:56AM: "I need a syllabus to listen to you talk!": I continue my previous entry, which was quite rudely interrupted by the end of my chas na internyete (hour on the internet) here at the International/Intercity Telephone Office in St. Petersburg. Quote in title is from a gal with whom I went to dinner at the Idiot Cafe last night.

To continue my ramble from yesterday:

Death, continued
What if Lincoln had lived? I know I'm pulling a hypothetical that "Head of the Class" (1980s TV show) would have considered trite (and believe me, some of the historical hypotheticals brought up by the history teacher in that show were pretty darn trite; that show really seemed to advance a rather superficial, "final cause" rather than "first cause" kind of understanding of history, in which individuals and not historical forces were crucial).

But I had just watched Bamboozled that day when I saw Arlington and then Lincoln's deathbed. And I wondered whether my country would be more whole today if some sort of racial reconciliation had occurred back 150 years ago.

I've been meaning for a long while to talk about my experience on June 11, when I first saw the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. It was the morning that Timothy McVeigh had been executed. The death-synchronicity was heavy in my heart.

(In one of the Dekalog films, Kieslowski contrasts the brutal, senseless killing of a taxi driver with the orderly, legal execution of that killer.)

Arlington -- far away from urban centers, acres and acres of headstones and grass -- had tried to be quiet, I think, allowing the silence of the graves to speak for themselves. The Holocaust Museum (in downtown D.C., opposite the U.S. Department of Agriculture) had the opposite strategy. It fairly shouted that we must never forget. From the moment of entry -- after the metal detector -- everywhere I looked was something to read, to experience, to absorb. Exhibit after exhibit. (I came too late to get a pass that day for the Permanent Exhibition, the rather famous one in which you walk chronologically through the period and carry a small biographical sketch of a Jew from the era. A friend of mine told me that his friend, after several visits to the museum, thought of that card as a lottery ticket. "Does mine die this time? No! Woo-hoo!")

A woman in my freshman-year English class at Cal -- one of something like ten twenty-year-old Jews in that class -- once said something to the effect of, "We're Holocaust kids. Our entire lives, we've been told, 'Never again.' And we've got that message." And she continued that there must be more to teach our children than "never again." (Seth's diary is relevant here.)

I think I need more time to figure out the rather profound problems I have with the Holocaust Museum. I'll write more when I've articulated it better.

Now, on to other topics.

It is rather blind to enjoy the cost of living here whilst complaining about the standard of living. Yes, I'm going to an opera at the Marinksii on Tuesday and I paid US$4 for my ticket, and therefore I will not complain about having to drink bottled and/or boiled water. A metro ride is about twenty cents, and as such, I don't whine about the lines. I get what I paid for.

I went to The Idiot last night, with four? three? girls and one guy.

You mean I'm not the sexiest geek alive? Oh, pish-tosh.

Must speak of cafe experience. The harrowing one.

Independently coming up with the same thing as someone else is cool. Like the calculus, or a joke.

There's a Pushkin story named "The Queen of Spades." The other day I passed by 10 Nyevskii Prospekt, where the story is set. "Once I was the Queen of Spades..."

First published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/23/7567/42546

# 24 Jun 2001, 10:29AM: The Tale of the Seven Bookmarks: Reciprocal linking frenzy!

And, my Segfault story made it to the top twenty of all time.

Bookmarks I visited a bookstore the other day, and what caught my eye? Bookmarks, for a ruble each! Twenty-nine for a dollar! Goodness. I collect bookmarks, so this was an opportunity not to be missed.

So I used my broken Russian, forgetting the very convenient "kazhdii" (every) in my search for a word for "each." But I succeeded in buying one of each bookmark. There were seven.

Three displayed pretty scenes of St. Petersburg. Two of those also displayed the rather optimistic line, "1703-2003."
Two featured cute doggies either using typewriters or computers.
One advertised an exhibit on the art of Islam, at some Russian museum. I like the multilingual, multicultural aspect.
One features pictures, and the name, of Ricky Martin.

Sometimes I just get tired of United States cultural hegemony, y'know?

First published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/24/102948/198

# 24 Jun 2001, 11:55AM: Kak ckazat po-russkie, "Windows blows"?: A question for the ages, asked by John, whose computer at an Internet access facility locked up.

More about cafes I've been to here during my eight or nine days in St. Petersburg, and -- if I can get to it! -- more thoughts on the Holocaust Museum in the US. The latter is continuing brainwane's Death Series, for which there is -- fortunately or no -- no Kausfiles Series-Skipper as of yet. (Note that -- rough approximation follows -- Kausfiles is to politics and, sometimes, culture, as Joel on Software is to software design and management.)

The Harrowing Restaurant Experience
Almost a week ago, I tried to visit, on my own, one of the cafes recommended in my three-year-old Rough Guide. I went on the metro three times, took some electric tram after a direction by natives, asked many people for directions, bought and ate a "Super Snickers" to relieve immediate hunger, and -- all in all -- eventually just stopped in at some restaurant that looked established. It turned out to be a relatively fancy dive, and pretty tourist-friendly, although the service was slow. After telling the waitress, "Ya ni yem myasa, riba, ili ptitsa, chto vui rekommenduyete?" (I don't eat meat, fish, or birds -- what do you recommend?), I ended up with a surprisingly good meal of spaghetti with mushrooms, washed down with two smallish glasses of mineralnaya voda (mineral water -- thank goodness for cognates).

The recorded music was fine and cheery -- even the Russian Backstreet Boys clone -- and the people seemed happy and lively, and the food was quite good. But I had second thoughts that grew along with the empty space on my plate. Hadn't there been two columns of prices on the menu? I remembered one of those lines as much higher than the other. One said that my dish was 90 rubles, which is about three bucks. The other had displayed the figure of 260 -- and I didn't have 260 rubles on me!

Food usually doesn't cost more than $5 per entree in Russia! But this is a pretty fancy place. And maybe it's like in some museums, where foreigners have to pay much higher prices than natives. Wait, I saw credit card logos on the door, which had convinced me that this is a reputable establishment. Was the logo of my card up there? I don't remember! Would it be okay to look? I'd have to get up and go to the door. There's a guy who looks a little authoritarian sitting by the bar. Maybe he'll come after me if I look like I'm trying to escape paying the bill, or if I try to pay in "hard currency" (US dollars -- it's illegal to use anything but rubles to buy stuff in Russia). What do I do?

Finally, I got up and walked a few steps to look at the menu again, and breathed a sigh of relief. The column on the left was marked, not "rubles," but "grams." It was telling me the mass of the entree.

I finished my meal, paid about $4 for my meal, left a tip (which they say you don't ahve to do in Russia), and left.

I changed twenty dollars into rubles on my way home.

The Idiot
I had a much different experience on my way to The Idiot -- a restaurant that especially caters to expatriates and vegetarians -- two nights back. John was the token male among Krista, Susanne, Rasa, and me. The food was good and the conversation lively, even as John and I geeked out and had to pull ourselves back far too often to be pretty. Krista, incidentally, was the one to tell me, "I feel like I need a syllabus to listen to you talk!"

At The Idiot, every reasonably-old-looking customer gets a free ("besplatno") shot of vodka with the meal. (The drinking age in Russia is 18 -- on paper, that is.) So all five of us got free shots. After eating my meal, I tried putting about three drops of it -- approx. 1/20th of the shot -- in my mouth. It stinks like a doctor's office, and I really have no need of social disinhibitors, as anyone who knows me knows well. So I don't think brainwane is going to become a pyannits (drunkard) anytime soon.

I'm avoiding the "do as the Romans do" quite consciously. I've never before been in a country where drinking has such an accepted and "natural" place in the national daily life. It's interesting to watch and to try and figure out why I'm a teetotaler.

There was a really friendly Finn who came and talked to us and who mentioned that he had gone to the same university, and school within Helsinki University, as Linus Torvalds.

Museum
I didn't want that museum to be crowded and loud, and I didn't want for anyone to be laughing, even though I realize that you can't deny life to consecrate the dead, and that the crowds meant that people were paying their respects -- in some cases.

I didn't want this place to be a tourist attraction, someplace to view in some sort of detached way, but I didn't want to see sentimental schlock either. But "sentimental schlock" is as vague a term as "acting like a tourist" or "acting like a chick."

Martin Gardner's "Surprise," which I had read the previous day, considers atheism and the possibility of a sense of awe and wonder, which reminds me of the last page of F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby.

Perhaps the main problem I had with the museum was this: I think, quite tentatively, that maybe the best way to remember the Holocaust is to -- as Avi in Cryptonomicon said our highest duty is -- prevent future Holocausts. And isn't the best way to do that, to nurture independence in the minds of humans, so that no person will blindly obey authority or commit actions unthinkingly, or go against her own conscience or ever become part of an apparatus of massacre? And how does this Museum do that?

But that is not the job of this museum -- this one is more "Never forget" as a means to "Never again." And I could be wrong. And, the only way to keep a human thinking all the time might be to make sure he never gets into a routine, such that he can unthinkingly do anything. And that's sort of a tough call, making sure that no action ever gets routinized.

First published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/24/115548/100

# 25 Jun 2001, 08:40AM GMT+5:30: Short -- books and religion, basically: Yesterday I finished reading Angela's Ashes and started reading We.

Catholicism appeals to me, in the same way as I imagine it appeals to a lot of people, what with the unconditional redemption and state of grace and all. I think Maxine Hong Kingston and/or Maya Angelou commented on this.

First published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/25/84014/2922

Filed under: Reading Religion

# 26 Jun 2001, 12:35PM: Rimsky-Course-akov: Went to the Marinskii Theater and slept through the odd-numbered acts. Good naps!

And, I'm taking a course on the Russian press. Today we read an article from 1997 on "khackeri" and "freakeri" and intellectual property crime in Russia. I am going to have to make a copy of that article and get Seth to make a two-hour speech or something.

First published by Sumana Harihareswara at http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2001/6/26/123550/257

# 27 Jun 2001, 10:05AM: OK, OK, Catholicism, my bad.: I went to Tsarskeyoe Selo today. Rather fun. I find the gardens more enjoyable than the herd experience through the gilt-trip palace itself.

I'm off to the LUG meeting really, really soon.