Have you ever been stopped in a public place to take someone else's picture? Anyone ever look around for someone, spot you amongst the crowd, and then ask you for directions? I bet everyone has, but the frequency of being asked probably varies by person, and depends on how a person looks. There is no scientific method for studying this, but I think I get disproportionately asked by people on the street to take their picture. I'm not sure how I feel about this, whether I should be complimented and take the task seriously as society's taskmaster, or feel offended that I get assigned random tasks, or get annoyed for it taking up a chunk of my time each time I do it, but I do think I have the answer for why I get asked a lot. The answer has to do with being very average.
Traits I possess that gets me picked for picture taking duty:
1.) Average looking- can't be too physically attractive, I think, or else people are asking your number for other reasons. I, for one, get intimated asking a member of the opposite gender that's too physically attractive for fear they think I'm hitting on them, or I'm a weirdo, and am consciously aware that they probably get asked like that all the time by other people. Sure, you'll look for the hottest chick in the room when it's group date time, but when picking out a poor guy to get your picture taken, better go with the safe guy who definitely will say yes.
2.) Not scary looking- no visible tattoos, not physically intimating, I'm not exactly scrawny but definitely don't look like I would beat anybody up, or be a crazy homeless guy who might just take your phone/camera.
3.) alone - probably the most underrated factor for being selected for the lottery of taking someone else's picture, as people don't like to trouble big groups of people, just pick out some poor schmuck who doesn't look like he's doing anything important anyway. At least, that's how I think. Also, a fear of bullies and groups of people encourages me to seek kindred spirits who are also alone and out there by themselves.
4.) wearing average clothing- people don't want to ask too well-dressed people for fear of getting looked down upon.
5.) Chinese/ Asian languages- it also helps that I look Asian, the most prominent feature on earth with the highest population. I've been stopped multiple times in the street by Chinese people asking if I'm Chinese....scratch that, directly speaking Mandarin to me assuming I know Chinese, asking me to help them find something.
I should also mention to future solicitors for photos that I'm actually pretty bad at taking photos, or so says my girlfriend, who is really good at taking photos, so every time I'm asked to take a photo with my girlfriend I graciously hand off the assignment to my girlfriend, who being the awesome girlfriend she is accepts and vicariously takes the picture. Thank you! I think the world is a better place for this, or at least photos of the world are better because of it. It has something to do with catching the lighting at the right angle and focusing the shot on the people so that they are in the center of the picture, instead of the "aim phone at the people, make sure they're in the lens, shoot and get out of there ASAP" approach that I take.
I can't also say that I'm that good with giving directions, which doesn't happen as often anymore anyway due to everyone having a digital map in their hand/pocket at all times. It feels like I get asked directions in cities I don't live in all the time, maybe cuz of the "travelers' compassion" theory I mentioned earlier: travelers see me walking around and assume I know where I'm going. Most of the time I DON'T know where I'm going. In Japan and in Europe, I was asked directions when I had no idea where to go. Even in Los Angeles, the city I've lived for most of my adult life, I'll get asked where something is and not know what that place is, or not sure how I describe it. My mind goes kinda blank like, "you go straight, turn left at........Jefferson St., I think? And then go 2 blocks and then turn right?" I keep thinking while I'm giving directions, "wouldn't it be easier to just use your phone/GPS?" and cross my fingers that I'm giving the right directions AND the recipients follow them correctly. There was definitely a time I gave out wrong directions to someone and realized it later, regretting I did it and hoping they didn't get lost and curse me to a fate of always getting lost.
How to avoid picture-taking duty:
1.) Act crazy
2.) avoid crowds of people, especially at tourist locations with an iconic structure. No one's gonna want to take a picture of a dark alley.
3.) Have kids with you: people have sympathy for parents who are already dealing with so much.
4.) Travel with girlfriend to dump the task on her. Thanks girlfriend!
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
Tuesday, November 22, 2016
Friday, November 18, 2016
High Class Restaurant (高級 レストラン )
My girlfriend and I went to a very fancy restaurant Friday night in Chicago called Alinea, truly a dining experience. Up until now I have been wary of spending too much on meals, but this restaurant eased those concerns in a terrific way, everything from the hostess being knowledgeable about our names, taking our coats, multiple servers taking our orders and presenting us with food (and giving us more than we ever needed to know about the ingredients), the lighting of the venue set to a low atmospheric mood, allowed my girlfriend and I to feel, for one night at least, in a completely different world of dining,
My favorite dishes:
1.) Wagyuu beef held with beef marrow. Unfortunately, only one bite to eat the whole thing, the crispy rice crumbled in the mouth "like a rice krispy treat," as the server said. Personally, it might as well have been a rice krispy treat; I couldn't tell the difference.
2.) Short Rib Bitter cocoa Cassis- basically, I liked all the dishes that included meat.......there wasn't that much of it. The short ribs were especially tender and contained ample flavor, definitely could tell the difference between it and normal rib places. Except for the fact I don't think I've ever complained about having ribs, so there wasn't much they could do to mess it up.
3.) Sanma (秋刀鱼), a Japanese type of fish, purportedly imported from the Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo, Japan, like I would know the difference, but nonetheless a very strong fish, shaped like a sardine, not much larger than a sardine. Nice cultural reference to a culture I'd been researching to match the refined taste, couldn't complain about this one.
4.) Pork Belly with curry and banana- gotta admit the pork belly was so good and so well cooked, but this is one case of almost doing too much, not sure the curry and banana helped the pork belly in any way, kinda just mixed up the tastes, and not sure the dish (which we held in our left hand while used a utensil in the other) helped in any way, especially since I held it for long enough to eat the pork belly in 1 or 2 bites, then sat it down again.
5.) Bubble Gum Sour cherry banana: interesting concept of making an edible helium balloon that allowed us to break it and have a very high-pitched voice for a little bit.
Lessons learned:
1.) For a high class restaurant, presentation is everything, taste is important but secondary. Bring the food in as many different variations as possible, including on pieces of ice, on a flmaing piece, a funnel that's gassing up, in a balloon shape, on top of what looks like a glass vase, etc.
2.) It's OK to leave the customer hungry (especially 175 pound highly active with high metabolism adult males, apparently.) as long as it's exceptional food.
3.) courses come regularly and only after the prior course had been consumed. Standard, of course, but I can't help wondering if I would have been better eating all these items together and at my own discretion: I guess the chef decides the order of what goes down the gullet to get the best effect.
4.) add as many sweet dishes as possible, skimp on meat and main courses. Isn't a bad strategy: sugar and sweet things tend to get tons of approval, no one complains, restaurant saves money. I personally would have preferred a lot more MEAT! (but I guess that's what a steakhouse is for).
5.) Have a foreign-sounding name for each dish, make it seem special and memorable to the guests, make it seem better than it was because it had a name (people love having names to remember stuff by) "Spectrum," "Swirl," "Cloche," and "Nostalgia" were just some of the dishes we dined on (and in some cases, gulped in one bite)
6.) It's like modern art or opera: the high class have different standards than the common folk, and can taste the refined nuances of the Sanma (Pacific saury) from Tsukiji Market v. other types of fish caught in specific places and would pay a premium for that kind of meal, much like a connosieur of art would pay thousands more for a certain type of painting from a certain type of artist. I personally just divided food into categories of "good food" v. "OK" to "bad food." and whether it tastes good or not, call me dense for not appreciating modern art or opera or high class restaurants (But I DID really appreciate my girlfriend treating me to this and opening my eyes to this high class dining lifestyle! - ah how the rich live)
Overall, as not a food critic, I thought it was a unique dining experience, like trying skydiving or rock climbing, except it was a bit expensive, and I didn't even get full. On a very practical level, it was a total loss: paid full price for not much nutrition, didn't even get a full meal. On an aesthetic level, though, a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I prefer somewhere in the middle for most of my meals, but for a once-in-a-while thing (maybe once-in-a-lifetime experience it was a great meal I'll remember forever. I just wish there was more.
My favorite dishes:
1.) Wagyuu beef held with beef marrow. Unfortunately, only one bite to eat the whole thing, the crispy rice crumbled in the mouth "like a rice krispy treat," as the server said. Personally, it might as well have been a rice krispy treat; I couldn't tell the difference.
2.) Short Rib Bitter cocoa Cassis- basically, I liked all the dishes that included meat.......there wasn't that much of it. The short ribs were especially tender and contained ample flavor, definitely could tell the difference between it and normal rib places. Except for the fact I don't think I've ever complained about having ribs, so there wasn't much they could do to mess it up.
3.) Sanma (秋刀鱼), a Japanese type of fish, purportedly imported from the Tsukiji Fish Market in Tokyo, Japan, like I would know the difference, but nonetheless a very strong fish, shaped like a sardine, not much larger than a sardine. Nice cultural reference to a culture I'd been researching to match the refined taste, couldn't complain about this one.
4.) Pork Belly with curry and banana- gotta admit the pork belly was so good and so well cooked, but this is one case of almost doing too much, not sure the curry and banana helped the pork belly in any way, kinda just mixed up the tastes, and not sure the dish (which we held in our left hand while used a utensil in the other) helped in any way, especially since I held it for long enough to eat the pork belly in 1 or 2 bites, then sat it down again.
5.) Bubble Gum Sour cherry banana: interesting concept of making an edible helium balloon that allowed us to break it and have a very high-pitched voice for a little bit.
Lessons learned:
1.) For a high class restaurant, presentation is everything, taste is important but secondary. Bring the food in as many different variations as possible, including on pieces of ice, on a flmaing piece, a funnel that's gassing up, in a balloon shape, on top of what looks like a glass vase, etc.
2.) It's OK to leave the customer hungry (especially 175 pound highly active with high metabolism adult males, apparently.) as long as it's exceptional food.
3.) courses come regularly and only after the prior course had been consumed. Standard, of course, but I can't help wondering if I would have been better eating all these items together and at my own discretion: I guess the chef decides the order of what goes down the gullet to get the best effect.
4.) add as many sweet dishes as possible, skimp on meat and main courses. Isn't a bad strategy: sugar and sweet things tend to get tons of approval, no one complains, restaurant saves money. I personally would have preferred a lot more MEAT! (but I guess that's what a steakhouse is for).
5.) Have a foreign-sounding name for each dish, make it seem special and memorable to the guests, make it seem better than it was because it had a name (people love having names to remember stuff by) "Spectrum," "Swirl," "Cloche," and "Nostalgia" were just some of the dishes we dined on (and in some cases, gulped in one bite)
6.) It's like modern art or opera: the high class have different standards than the common folk, and can taste the refined nuances of the Sanma (Pacific saury) from Tsukiji Market v. other types of fish caught in specific places and would pay a premium for that kind of meal, much like a connosieur of art would pay thousands more for a certain type of painting from a certain type of artist. I personally just divided food into categories of "good food" v. "OK" to "bad food." and whether it tastes good or not, call me dense for not appreciating modern art or opera or high class restaurants (But I DID really appreciate my girlfriend treating me to this and opening my eyes to this high class dining lifestyle! - ah how the rich live)
Overall, as not a food critic, I thought it was a unique dining experience, like trying skydiving or rock climbing, except it was a bit expensive, and I didn't even get full. On a very practical level, it was a total loss: paid full price for not much nutrition, didn't even get a full meal. On an aesthetic level, though, a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I prefer somewhere in the middle for most of my meals, but for a once-in-a-while thing (maybe once-in-a-lifetime experience it was a great meal I'll remember forever. I just wish there was more.
Wednesday, November 16, 2016
Juujutsu (柔術)
Recently in the post-World Series, football ratings-diminishing, getting-tired-of-the-same-old-sports I grew up world, I started taking interest in a new, fast-growing sport ( I hope this isn't like poker in the mid-2000's that quickly fizzled): Mixed Martial Arts, which has been taken up by many different organizations, but the organization that has the most publicity and the most money and therefore draw the best fighters in the world and the most fans around the world: Ultimate Fighting Championship, or UFC.
MMA involves a variety of disciplines, but one of the most pervasive is a technique called juujutsu, originated from the Japanese art. Or as the English version spelling goes, jujutsu. There's also karate, Brazilian juujutsu, wrestling, and judo, muay thai. I can't tell very well one from the other (I believe muay thai is heavily kick-based), but I do enjoy the hell out of watching it. The sport capitalizes on a lost art of fighting without weapons (sorely needed break from the gun-fighting in the world as well as in movies, and not just the pre-choreographed hand-to-hand combat scenes from movies, these fights are very real and the fighters are very much suffering pain/trying to outmaneuver an opponent who's hitting them back. The best part about the sport to me is the pace of a match, a match is usually scheduled for 3 rounds of 5 minutes each (sometimes 5 rounds) but can end at any time due to knockout or submission, so the viewer's gotta keep his or her eyes peeled, there's a guarantee it won't last for 3 hours like the traditional sports, and it's high-flying, action-packed, hands and bodies moving everywhere. That also leads to the worst thing about the sport: the constant, violent movement causes a lot of violence, blood, and the worst thing in sports nowadays: concussions. Oh and there's doping issues, as many fighters are suspected to be on steroids, using some sort of masking agent to get away with it.
MMA involves a variety of disciplines, but one of the most pervasive is a technique called juujutsu, originated from the Japanese art. Or as the English version spelling goes, jujutsu. There's also karate, Brazilian juujutsu, wrestling, and judo, muay thai. I can't tell very well one from the other (I believe muay thai is heavily kick-based), but I do enjoy the hell out of watching it. The sport capitalizes on a lost art of fighting without weapons (sorely needed break from the gun-fighting in the world as well as in movies, and not just the pre-choreographed hand-to-hand combat scenes from movies, these fights are very real and the fighters are very much suffering pain/trying to outmaneuver an opponent who's hitting them back. The best part about the sport to me is the pace of a match, a match is usually scheduled for 3 rounds of 5 minutes each (sometimes 5 rounds) but can end at any time due to knockout or submission, so the viewer's gotta keep his or her eyes peeled, there's a guarantee it won't last for 3 hours like the traditional sports, and it's high-flying, action-packed, hands and bodies moving everywhere. That also leads to the worst thing about the sport: the constant, violent movement causes a lot of violence, blood, and the worst thing in sports nowadays: concussions. Oh and there's doping issues, as many fighters are suspected to be on steroids, using some sort of masking agent to get away with it.
MMA in my opinion will overtake boxing (if it hasn't already) in popularity, if only for the nature of MMA: it's boxing PLUS other stuff, so more elements of fighting are incorporated. Boxing has the tradition and legends of the past, but there's really not many great fighters with names out there, and Mayweather v. Pacquiao last year might have been the last great fight people would pay to watch, and the fight turned casual fans away from the sport: "great, I spent an hour to watch Mayweather dancing away," etc., etc. The submission element in MMA brings a whole another element where a fighter can be pounding away at his opponent but make one mistake against a grappler (fighter who's good at wrestling, fighting on the ground, etc.) and somehow win out of nowhere. Fascinating stuff, and a lot more strategy involved it seems like than just pounding the hell out of somebody.
Future ideas: possibly incorporating some kind of fantasy element to it, would do a lot to get the fantasy nerds into the sport and invested in the results.
Hopefully the rise of MMA will foreshadow the rise of another sport that no one knows about but is unbelievably enjoyable and thrilling to watch: Dodgeball!
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
Thursday, November 10, 2016
True Feelings v. Outer Facade (本音 & 建前)
Japanese has a special term for something that's a universal concept: Acting a certain way on the outside to the public (tatemae) but feeling something different internally, aka one's true feelings. For Japanese this is usually reserved for business situations, like talking to a boss or co-workers, but it can also refer to
It also has a great deal to do with the current situation of Donald Trump becoming elected President.
The Donald was a very divisive figure during his whole campaign, with those who loved his brash and demeaning attitude (interrupting everyone) while it put others off, very few people having a neutral opinion on Trump. Which is why national election polls might have been so off in the days right before the election- many polls had Hilary with a comfortable lead and a 90%+ chance to win the election. This could have been caused by tatemae: people outwardly indicating the public stance and non-shaming stance of voting for Trump, when in fact they did vote for Trump. (not necessarily because they support Trump's brash behavior and treatment of minorities, women, etc., there are definitely these people among Trump's supporters but to win almost half the popular vote he needed more- people who are Republican but don't want to admit voting for Trump). They told the polls they weren't voting, but in the voting booth when their honne (true feelings) were on the line and nobody could criticize them for it, they voted for Trump, the de facto Republican candidate. Which is their right- there's so many other factors other than personality and treatment of others that matter in a presidential choice.... immigration, foreign policy, domestic policy, stance on abortion, stance on legalization of marijauna, etc., etc........heck, a bunch of my fellow Chinese Americans voted Republican to stop affirmative action (I know, sounds trivial, but that's a real issue for many Asian Americans). And because of the voting discrepancy, for better or worse (and I hope actually it's for the better!) Trump.
How could it be for the better? I admit it's not likely, but I and many other Americans should hope that the Donald's honne (true feelings) doesn't match up with how he presents himself to the public, and more importantly, to his voting base. First of all, Donald Trump is a VERY smart person (I'm not saying he's not a jerk, homophobic, etc., but even his worst critics have to give it up to him that he's smart, not only in his business deals but simply because he somehow became President of the U.S. through smoke and mirrors). That takes real knowledge of the American public. When I was watching the Donald meet with President Obama today in a brief meeting at the White House, though, I wondered as Obama and Donald praised each other and showed mutual respect for each other despite the whole year jabbing at each other during the campaign: What if it's all an act? Trump's a reality TV star, it's totally feasible that he acts a certain way in front of the cameras and now his voting base, says all of the things that a normal politician might say (promises that are destined to be broken), but actually doesn't feel as extreme about those ideas and just wants to become President to help the country? Sure, Trump could just be a lying egotistical maniac who wanted power so badly he'll wreck the country and sacrifice America's moral compass, but I think there's definitely a chance at my scenario. The honne (internal thoughts) could be that he achieved the Presidency, put the campaign behind him, act presidential, and lead the country like many great men before him have. I hope I'm right, and America surely hopes so.
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
It also has a great deal to do with the current situation of Donald Trump becoming elected President.
The Donald was a very divisive figure during his whole campaign, with those who loved his brash and demeaning attitude (interrupting everyone) while it put others off, very few people having a neutral opinion on Trump. Which is why national election polls might have been so off in the days right before the election- many polls had Hilary with a comfortable lead and a 90%+ chance to win the election. This could have been caused by tatemae: people outwardly indicating the public stance and non-shaming stance of voting for Trump, when in fact they did vote for Trump. (not necessarily because they support Trump's brash behavior and treatment of minorities, women, etc., there are definitely these people among Trump's supporters but to win almost half the popular vote he needed more- people who are Republican but don't want to admit voting for Trump). They told the polls they weren't voting, but in the voting booth when their honne (true feelings) were on the line and nobody could criticize them for it, they voted for Trump, the de facto Republican candidate. Which is their right- there's so many other factors other than personality and treatment of others that matter in a presidential choice.... immigration, foreign policy, domestic policy, stance on abortion, stance on legalization of marijauna, etc., etc........heck, a bunch of my fellow Chinese Americans voted Republican to stop affirmative action (I know, sounds trivial, but that's a real issue for many Asian Americans). And because of the voting discrepancy, for better or worse (and I hope actually it's for the better!) Trump.
How could it be for the better? I admit it's not likely, but I and many other Americans should hope that the Donald's honne (true feelings) doesn't match up with how he presents himself to the public, and more importantly, to his voting base. First of all, Donald Trump is a VERY smart person (I'm not saying he's not a jerk, homophobic, etc., but even his worst critics have to give it up to him that he's smart, not only in his business deals but simply because he somehow became President of the U.S. through smoke and mirrors). That takes real knowledge of the American public. When I was watching the Donald meet with President Obama today in a brief meeting at the White House, though, I wondered as Obama and Donald praised each other and showed mutual respect for each other despite the whole year jabbing at each other during the campaign: What if it's all an act? Trump's a reality TV star, it's totally feasible that he acts a certain way in front of the cameras and now his voting base, says all of the things that a normal politician might say (promises that are destined to be broken), but actually doesn't feel as extreme about those ideas and just wants to become President to help the country? Sure, Trump could just be a lying egotistical maniac who wanted power so badly he'll wreck the country and sacrifice America's moral compass, but I think there's definitely a chance at my scenario. The honne (internal thoughts) could be that he achieved the Presidency, put the campaign behind him, act presidential, and lead the country like many great men before him have. I hope I'm right, and America surely hopes so.
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
Wednesday, November 9, 2016
Election Day 2016 Vote (投票)
This year, for the first time ever, I voted in an election for public office/ public policies. (I've voted for school council elections, law school school body elections, etc.) My stance had previously been that voting was a waste of time, that my vote would be lost in a sea of other votes without making any impact whatsoever, that democracy isn't the best form of government anyway (see my previous post on a benign dictator), but I had to admit to myself that I was also just being lazy, and I shouldn't knock voting until I try it. So I sent in my mail-in vote from Chicago to California and actually voiced my opinion, and I realized that a.) I don't get an email confirmation or anything that CA actually received my vote, so I don't know if I actually made a difference or not, the results don't show how individual people voted, b.) there's a LOT of issues I'm not informed on, included the many CA propositions that were on the ballot, and c.) I could abstain from voting on issues that I didn't know about ( I did, including CA governor and CA's representative for US Senate, because I had no knowledge about who the candidates were. I DID vote on gun control, legalization of marijuana, death penalty, plastic bag abolition, and forcing adult film actors to wear condoms, because, well, I understood those issues and how I felt about them. Ultimately, I didn't think my vote was that significant, but I felt better that I knew about those issues, and the whole process was worth it.
Then Donald Trump won the election, and the whole world exploded. It is really telling that out of the many facebook friends I have, not a single one went on Facebook to boast that they had voted for Trump. This tells a lot about the demographic I'm in, but also the demographic that Trump voters comprise of: mostly white uneducated voters. Many of my facebook friends consider it an outrage that Trump won, and that the world is doomed, and how could this have happened, and he's not qualified to be the President, and that Bernie (Sanders) would have won, and that these are the 3rd party voters who were turned off by Hilary's fault, and it was stupid people's fault, and lots of fingerpointing and crying. I get why people are so upset, and I get that many people's lives are affected more deeply than mine is due to Trump getting elected. But unfortunately, somehow that's how democracy works: you don't get what you want. The majority gets what they want, no matter if the majority differs slightly from the minority's views and just want to tweak it a bit, or as in this election, the majority is MILES away from what the minority's views are. Sometimes the uneducated or the rural parts of America want to have their voice heard, and you can't say that they're wrong: they have the right to vote, they get a right to be represented just like everyone else, no matter if one thinks they're uneducated or don't know the evils of Trump.
I guess my takeaway is, these things happen, and don't get too emotional about the election results, try to stay positive, and understand that shocking things do happen in elections, and that just because others have a vastly different opinion, doesn't mean that they're wrong. Trump represents something different for the people who voted for him in this last election, and that thing might be exactly what Trump opponents are doing: shaming the Trump voters for voting the way they did. Maybe, just maybe, the Trump voters are doing it because of Trump opponents (like myself) who pretend we know everything and tell them that Trump is racist, not a good human being, bad for the country, but they want a different voice and to be represented, not to accede to the "educated" or Democratic part of America. So let's seek to understand why these election results happened, not point fingers and make plans to move to Canada or other countries. That's the America we live, for better or worse.
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
Then Donald Trump won the election, and the whole world exploded. It is really telling that out of the many facebook friends I have, not a single one went on Facebook to boast that they had voted for Trump. This tells a lot about the demographic I'm in, but also the demographic that Trump voters comprise of: mostly white uneducated voters. Many of my facebook friends consider it an outrage that Trump won, and that the world is doomed, and how could this have happened, and he's not qualified to be the President, and that Bernie (Sanders) would have won, and that these are the 3rd party voters who were turned off by Hilary's fault, and it was stupid people's fault, and lots of fingerpointing and crying. I get why people are so upset, and I get that many people's lives are affected more deeply than mine is due to Trump getting elected. But unfortunately, somehow that's how democracy works: you don't get what you want. The majority gets what they want, no matter if the majority differs slightly from the minority's views and just want to tweak it a bit, or as in this election, the majority is MILES away from what the minority's views are. Sometimes the uneducated or the rural parts of America want to have their voice heard, and you can't say that they're wrong: they have the right to vote, they get a right to be represented just like everyone else, no matter if one thinks they're uneducated or don't know the evils of Trump.
I guess my takeaway is, these things happen, and don't get too emotional about the election results, try to stay positive, and understand that shocking things do happen in elections, and that just because others have a vastly different opinion, doesn't mean that they're wrong. Trump represents something different for the people who voted for him in this last election, and that thing might be exactly what Trump opponents are doing: shaming the Trump voters for voting the way they did. Maybe, just maybe, the Trump voters are doing it because of Trump opponents (like myself) who pretend we know everything and tell them that Trump is racist, not a good human being, bad for the country, but they want a different voice and to be represented, not to accede to the "educated" or Democratic part of America. So let's seek to understand why these election results happened, not point fingers and make plans to move to Canada or other countries. That's the America we live, for better or worse.
Fantasize on,
Robert Yan
Wednesday, November 2, 2016
World Series Game 7
Long time no sports posts, but I had to memorialize the historic Game 7 World Series game tonight between the Cleveland Indians and the Chicago Cubs. That's right, the Chicago Cubs! My 10-year-old or 16-year-old self would have been so elated to find out the Cubs would be in a World Series, much less a Game 7. Back then all Cubs fans like myself had to look forward to were Sammy Sosa, Mark Grace, lovable losers, and rare playoff appearances that didn't result in anything close to the playoffs. It seemed like summer after summer of futility, listening to dynamic team of Pat Hughes and Ron Santo, an awesome way to spend childhood summer evenings learning the game as a Chinese immigrant. The Cubs lost a lot, but the radio team was awesome, almost like listening to a friendly conversation between guys at a game and enjoying themselves, and it was through these broadcasts I learned the essence of baseball:
Baseball isn't about winning all the time, going to the World Series, always being in must-win attitude. Sure, winning is nice, no doubt about it, and allows for excitement, but baseball is about a way of life, everything from the awesome baseball stadiums (why I did my baseball trip!), to baseball cards, to radio broadcasts, to taking the whole family to the game, to pennant races, to enjoying the evening outside at a baseball game, so many different things other than winning go into the baseball experience. Sure it's a long season, and 162 games is probably excessive for one sport (It's nearly half the year! If you include spring training and the postseason, it's more than half the year!) but part of the essence of baseball is its consistency, that it's always there, there's a game almost every day of the summer, that resonates with the changing of seasons and becomes a daily lifestyle for lovers of the game.
As I've grown older, my interest in baseball have diminished a bit: I still keep track of scores through fantasy baseball, but I don't watch games, I don't devote large chunks of time to checking out baseball stats, and I don't even hold myself out to others as a Cubs fan (deep in my heart, though, there's still a true blue, Cubbie-blue blood Cubs fan). I am not a big fan of people generating negative energy against negative fans, becoming unruly after excessive amount of drinks, and paying hundreds of dollars just to get into a Wrigleyville bar (not even the actual game!) or missing work the day after Game 7 (as many people are doing) to celebrate the Cubs victory, but I still understand the exuberance, the long pent-up fandom of Cubs fan. Trust me, I get it. Plus, it's game 7 of a World Series, one of the best sporting events in any sport, with historical ramifications (Indians haven't won the World Series since 1945, Cubs 1908). One of the best days in sports in a long time, and the team that I grew up watching (and listening to) is part of it. This is what a sports fan dreams of, and hopes to avoid the post-game partying and/or rioting (depending on the outcome) afterwards. Can't wait!
GO Cubs GO!
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