NF LOL

I spoke with my Dad in Seattle on Christmas and, because we aren't allowed to talk about politics (he's a total MAGA-head) we did our usual thing and talked about (American) football.

And the thing is, I've managed to go through the fall and winter not paying any attention to the NFL at all.  Between the illegal blacklisting of Kaepernick (here's hoping he wins a shit-ton of money from the bastards with his ongoing lawsuit) and the fact that my home team has a racist name and owner I just can't be bothered.

Odds are I'll still watch the Superbowl, but everybody knows that's less of a football thing and more of a cultural ritual.

Anyhow, the NBA is a hell of a lot more fun to watch.

Baseball isn't, but my love of baseball, American and Korean, is highly irrational and very old-manish of me.

"a million deaths is a statistic"

I spent Christmas Day (which is a national holiday here in lovely South Korea, but only for one calendar date) doing traditional Yuletide things like watching The Death of Stalin.

The performances were incredible.  If you told me Steve Buscemi could "work" as Nikita Khrushchev I'd have laughed at you.

Sure, many liberties were taken, but the essentially comical nature of Stalinism comes across, as does the utter barbarity and tragedy of what was the ultimate terror state.

I'm far from an expert, but having read Simon Montefiore's Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar definitely helped me keep the many characters straight.

The murders and shootings and beatings and gulags, the shattered lives in general -- they didn't serve a purpose, they were ends in and of themselves.  Terror was the point of it all.

The Death of Stalin makes this crystal clear, and you'll feel bad for finding it so awfully hilarious at the same time.

It had to be a comedy.  It could only be one.

"safe treyf"

My step-father is Jewish, so I have a small bit of insight into the ways of The Tribe.  And I knew that going to a Chinese restaurant for Christmas wasn't just a myth.  (Then again, we never went to one because he genuinely loved Christmas himself.  Much more than I ever did, being the Grinch that I am.)

But here's a great article that gets into the history of Jews eating Chinese food on Jesus' Birthday:

"[Q]  Was there any reason, beyond proximity, that Jews wound up eating Chinese food, as opposed to some other immigrant cuisine?

[A]  In terms of kosher law, a Chinese restaurant is a lot safer than an Italian restaurant. In Italian food, there is mixing of meat and dairy. A Chinese restaurant doesn’t mix meat and dairy, because Chinese cooking is virtually dairy-free.

In Chinese-American cooking, if there is any pork (which is not a kosher food), it is usually concealed inside something, like a wonton. A lot of Jews back then — and even now — kept strict kosher inside the home but were more flexible with foods they ate at restaurants. Sociologist Gaye Tuchman wrote about this practice. She described (the plausible deniability of non-kosher ingredients) as safe treyf. (Treyf is the Yiddish word for non-kosher.) A lot of Jews considered the pork in Chinese food to be safe treyf, because they couldn’t see it. That made it easier to eat."

Of course, the history of Chinese food in America is a whole other story.

Reckoning With Rice

North Koreans who defect to South Korea face some serious hurdles when it comes to integrating into a larger, faster-moving, and highly competitive society.  Even the basics of eating a meal are one of them:

"'When they first arrive there are so many different options, that they don’t know what to eat,' he said. 'But they always crave rice, so they pretty much eat mostly rice for the first two to three months, even if there are many other options available. And then after this phase, they start missing food they had back home.'

Kim, a waitress who asked to be identified only by her surname, only ate rice a few times a year when she was in North Korea, instead subsisting mostly on corn. When she first arrived in the South in 2017 she was 'completely awed' by the supermarkets, eating a constant stream of spicy Jin instant noodles for months before she became sick of the taste.

'No matter how much I worked in North Korea I could never afford rice,' she said. 'So now I can never throw away rice, even if I order too much.'”

Older South Koreans with any memory of the Korean War and its related hardships aren't slouches either when it comes to not letting any food go to waste, so I imagine North Koreans must be at a whole other level of frugality.

2018 Was Rather Draining For All Sentient Beings, No?

Christmas is some bullshit.

— Very Legal & Cool James (@wetcasements) December 24, 2018

"Love's a feeling / and so is stealing"

The Slits, Peel Sessions '77

I'll be finishing this year trying to wrap up two music biographies, Viv Albertine's Clothes, Clothes, Clothes.  Music, Music, Music.  Boys, Boys, Boys. and Elvis Costello's Unfaithful Music & Disappearing Ink.

The thing is, I'm much more of a natural Costello fan.  I've been listening to his music ever since college where I made mix-tapes of his stuff for people who hadn't heard of him.  I was borderline obsessed for a good five years, and to this day can make an argument for Blood and Chocolate being one of the most insightful albums about sex and relationships ever made, despite the really (intentionally?) shitty guitar tone.

I came later to The Slits and, frankly, probably relegated them to "interesting political chicks who couldn't actually play their instruments" during my first listens.  I'll cop to that much.  My former rockism sins are many.

But reading the books side by side has been interesting.  First off, London between 1975 and 1979 or so must have been a hell of a place to exist.  The frisson must have been incredible, as was the actual violence and rape and (ahem) anarchy.  (Albertine narrowly escaped a gang rape but unfortunately Ari Up, at a mere 15 or 16, wasn't so lucky).

That said, Albertine's memoir is the much more compelling read.  It's tighter and more focused for sure, split into pre- and during-Slit years, and then post-Slit years.  Albertine is so incredibly honest about failure and feelings of artistic and personal inadequacy it can hurt at times.

And the Costello book is really great as well, but a different beast in general, much more of a baggy, anecdotal monster.  There are tons of really bad-good Dad jokes, which I didn't expect but probably should have.

Both books have tons of great pictures though, and both are worth your time.

And as for coming to fully appreciate The Slits, their Peel Sessions do a lot more for me than their actual studio albums, but their jittery cover of "Heard It Through The Grapevine" is still killer.  (That was the first thing they ever recorded in a professional studio with an actual engineer.)

"I ain't into trickin' / I'm into treatin'"

Ice Cube, "That New Funkadelic"

It's almost 2019 and Ice Cube is still pretty good at what he does.

In what's become something of a holiday tradition here in lurvely Daegu, I'm meeting some of my adult students for a sushi feast this Saturday.

I think Baby Jesus would definitely approve.

God bless all the little sushis.

Post-Rockin'

Tortoise, "Prepare Your Coffin"

I hate grading.  It's basically witnessing in real time all the mistakes I made as a teacher over the course of the past semester.

That is all.

"dreaming is free"

Say Sue Me, "Dreaming"

A good cover song is an art-form unto itself.

Going over musical "Best Of 2018" lists is a bit of a compulsion for me and, frankly, I didn't listen to a hell of a lot of new music this year.  Part of me doesn't care at all -- I'm an old, after all.  Part of me would like to devote more time to seeking out new stuff but, at the risk of sounding like Grampa Simpson, the new stuff doesn't do much for me.  (The 1975?  Really?)

But finding Say Sue Me (through a former Korean ex-pat on Facebook no less) was worth it.  In fact, they're playing a Christmas show that I might even go down to Busan for.  (I haven't seen them live yet.)  But this cover of Blondie's "Dreaming" is pretty much perfect.

Also really enjoyed boygenius.  And the new Beach House.  And the new Sea and Cake.

But that's cheating because everything by Beach House and Sea and Cake is consistently sublime.

"not like medicine, but like meat"

Laurie Penny went on a Mediterranean crypto-currency-cruise and hilarity (and sharp writing, as always) ensued:

"The women on this boat are polished and perfect; the men, by contrast, seem strangely cured—not like medicine, but like meat. They are almost all white, between the ages of 30 and 50, and are trying very hard to have the good time they paid thousands for, while remaining professional in a scene where many thought leaders have murky pasts, a tendency to talk like YouTube conspiracy preachers, and/or the habit of appearing in magazines naked and covered in strawberries. That last is 73-year-old John McAfee, who got rich with the anti-virus software McAfee Security before jumping into cryptocurrencies. He is the man most of the acolytes here are keenest to get their picture taken with and is constantly surrounded by private security who do their best to aesthetically out-thug every Armani-suited Russian skinhead on deck. Occasionally he commandeers the grand piano in the guest lounge, and the young live-streamers clamor for the best shot. John McAfee has never been convicted of rape and murder, but—crucially—not in the same way that you or I have never been convicted of rape or murder. I do not interview John McAfee. He interests me less than he scares the shit out of me, though his entourage seems relaxed. They’re already living in the crypto-utopia behind his strange pale-blue eyes."

The whole thing is similarly excellent.

Another Good Day In Korea

Adult student gave me some home-made kimchi last night (it's Kimchi season here in Korea).

My refrigerator is now pleasantly stinky.

— Very Legal & Cool James (@wetcasements) December 7, 2018

"Everybody's Happy Nowadays"

The Buzzcocks, "Why Can't I Touch It?"

R.I.P. Pete Shelley.

Profiles In Courage

Republican politician: "I do not support live dismemberment!"

American media: "WHAT A NATIONAL HERO!"#TCOT #MAGA @realDonaldTrump

— Very Legal & Cool James (@wetcasements) December 5, 2018

Kimchi Season

While far from dying out, the Korean practice of "kimgjang" or making fresh kimchi in late fall, is being challenged by an abundance of store-made options:

"While the more affordable option is to buy bulk-made kimchi from one of the market leaders - such as Daesang or CJ Cheiljedang - some are choosing other options. Among many kimchi masters who sell their product through social media accounts, Park Kwang-hee of PKH Food, who uses the title 'Art of Kimchi Mama,' is getting the most attention. Alongside making the ordinary baechu kimchi, made with cabbage, or ggakdugi, made with white radish, she has used a variety of vegetables available in Pyeongchang, Gangwon, where she lives, including dandelion. She has studied and researched different types of kimchi for decades. She said thinking outside the box to make kimchi with items that people don’t commonly recognize as main kimchi ingredients sells well. Some of the modern Korean restaurants, including the recently opened Myomi, serve Park’s kimchi as banchan, a side dish that commonly comes with rice and soup. With more and more locals buying her kimchi, her packages have become a gift to bring when people go overseas. She has started to export her kimchi to Europe. 

As kimjang, the kimchi making culture registered with Unesco since 2013, is now endangered, many cultural institutions are rolling up their sleeves to keep the tradition alive. At the the fifth annual Seoul Kimchi Festival earlier this month, over 3,000 gathered to making kimchi together, aiming to break the Guinness Book of World Records. The previous record for the number of people making kimchi together was 2,635. Schools and regional governments hold smaller events to draw locals in the neighborhood so they can better understand kimjang. People can just come and go whenever they want, without being at the kimjang event from the very start to the end."

I like the store-made stuff just fine but as a foreigner my palate isn't really advanced enough to notice flavor differences in various kimchi types.  But taking a cab or bus downtown and passing a local church or hospital where 20 Korean aunties are out making kimchi together, clad in plastic gloves and sun visors, is a pretty iconic (and welcome) image this time of year.

The Anti-Ramsay

This weekend I started binge-watching the first season of David Chang's Ugly Delicious, and it didn't disappoint.  He jumps right into the fraught question of "authenticity" in food by traveling between Brooklyn, Napoli, LA, and, ahem, spending a day working at a local Domino's to get to the heart of understanding pizza.

It was great.  It was totally unpretentious.  The Domino's stuff really impressed me as well because in addition to saying the occasional craving for Corporate Garbage Food doesn't make you an awful person, he took the time to seriously interview the manager and delivery dude as to how they saw their roles in the larger food universe.  He did it, as a Michelin-starred chef, without any hint of condescension.

I'm looking forward to the rest, and season two as well.