It’s been like the Indian summer lately in Zoo York, rains so much.
Well, the Indian in the Indian summer refers to the American red Indians. Not PC … politically correct? Pardon me for my poor command of chiglish.
Lisa invited us over for dinner: Ed just came back from India, a short sabbatical.
The India that’s next to China.
Wrong again?
Ok, let me think … the India not too far from China.
.. I’m heading to the Village school, soon. So no complains ok?
The food was really delicious.
I won’t be eating for a few days.
…
Ha sorry I’m still a predator
The Butterfly Lovers or simply Liang Zhu is a Chinese legend about the tragic romance between two lovers, Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai (梁山伯與祝英台), Chinese version of Romeo and Juliet.
Some plantes attract more or different kind of bugs. They visit me all the time, a wasp (or bee) or two too.
The legend of Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai is a beautiful, doleful, and moving love story. The story is set in the Eastern Jin Dynasty: 265–420.
The legend begins with a beautiful, intelligent young woman named Zhu Yingtai from Shangyu, Zhejiang, who is the ninth child and the only daughter of the wealthy noble Zhu family. After much effort, she convinced her father to let her disguise herself as a young man traveling to Hangzhou to study. During her journey, she encountered Liang Shanbo, a scholar from Kuaiji (會稽, Kuàijī, now known as Shaoxing), in the same province. They felt like old friends at the first meeting. Therefore, they gathered some soil as incense and took vows of brotherhood in the pavilion of a thatched bridge.
For the three years in school, they shared the same room where there was only one bed and two quilts. Yingtai slowly fell in love with Shanbo. Although being every bit Yingtai’s equal in studies, Shanbo was a bookworm and did not see any traces of female characteristics in Yingtai.
Time flew by quickly. Three years passed, and one day Yingtai received a letter from her father asking her to return home as quickly as possible. Yingtai had no alternative but to pack her belongings immediately and bid farewell. In Yingtai’s heart, she had decided that even if heaven and earth died, her love for Liang Shanbo would never change, and she wanted to be with him for all eternity. Hence, before her departure, Yingtai revealed her true identity to her headmaster’s wife and requested the headmaster’s wife to hand her jade pendant as a betrothal gift to Shanbo.
… …
You can read the rest on wiki.
Keep in mind my camera is really a run of mill thing, very slow, Casio Exilim EX-Z60. 影相佬 Lou said the new model (point and shot class) is the fastest on the market. Hmmmmm … new toy?
The lovers … seeing a grown man cry is jarring. Heart breaking both in ways that man normally don’t shed tears easily and two it’s for love. Can he honestly fall back in love with his wife? Good thing that Mark Sanford didn’t make his wife Jenny stood by him while he confessed and cried.
Without consutling the dictionary or web, I’d say 7 years – The Seven Years Itch.
The oldest JoBro is engaged to his longtime girlfriend, Danielle Deleasa, People reported.
…
The couple met in May 2007, while vacationing with their families in the Bahamas.
So two years is long time.
The Jonas brothers made the front cover of the RollingStone magazine. America really is an instant gratification/reality show nation. I’m watching them in horror. They have gone mad. They become the Amertrash on this side of the pond fm the Eurotrash.
Ok, the Kate/Jon. That’s enough. Until they’re devoicing did I know the parents of 8 kids exited. What’s their redeeming value worthy this much of the media’s attention? Or the America has become the 幸灾乐祸 -take pleasure in other’s misfortune nation too?
The main street is always slower than Wall Street. When something hit the main street, it is either the game is over or too late.
Duh.
Everyone on WS knows this. Why did it take By Matt Taibbi at Rolling Stone this long for someone to write for the main streeters?
The Wall Street Bubble Mafia. How Goldman Sachs took over Washington? By engineering every major market manipulation since the Great Depression. If someone believes that the president of the United States runs Washington, then he or she hasn’t lived long enough.
At midnight one evening earlier this month, I slipped out of Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, heading north in a white Toyota minibus on a journey to find the second tallest mountain on earth, K2.
My purpose was to write a book about the mountaineers who dared challenge its deadly slopes — to get a taste, if not a full draught, of the danger myself. In the end, I got more than I bargained for, and not from Nature alone.
…
At Askole, a village of basic wooden homes where children played shoeless in the dirt, we hired eager Balti porters who jostled for our business and streamed by on the hot, dusty paths beside waters churning down from the glacier. The porters bent under our rucksacks and tents, heavy blue food barrels, paraffin stoves, kitchen chairs and tables, as they ushered chickens, goats, yaks and donkeys onto the trail.
In contrast to the porters’ cast-off clothes and sandals, these mountaineers wore expensive high-tech walking gear. A 39-year-old engineer from Germany, Dirk Grunert, obsessively drank liters of boiled water daily to cope with the altitude. A fit couple from Portugal maintained via satellite phone a Web site of their adventures. There were also three Polish mountaineers, including a loud man named Jacek Teler, on his sixth trip in the Karakoram, who conferred with the porters in broken Urdu, performed kung-fu exercises in the mess tent, and was clearly seeking a chance to live a role distant from reality as most of us know it.
…
My 40 years old sister-in-law finally is engaged.
To a Caucasian.
This should not have been the case should her mother had her way.
When I first met my husband. One day I went to shopping with his mother and two younger sisters. In the car, the mother said to the youngster daughter,
“If you married someone other than Chinese, I’ll disown you.”
I was new to this country but I felt odd.
None of her children speak Chinese, neither her husband.
Secondly, why would a mother impose her will on her children?
Is Chinese that much better?
Sorry I said yes when the first guy proposed. (Well, almost.)
It happened Golfer’s Chinese even he doesn’t speaks the language.
It’s only in the USA, thing has to be politically correct. So there are many dashes.
Like Chinese-American. He never visited China.
Or African-American, even most of them have nothing to do with Africa.
Anyway, it turned out, every single guy she dated was non Chinese.
One year, a friend of older sister came to visit. He’s Chinese, good looking and a grad from Stanford law school. My in-laws were elated. They bought US Open tickets for us to go.
Mr. Stanford could not sit still. Constantly going shopping and wondering around. When he did sit down, he loudly made comment like
“Oh, look Johnny Mac.” Ya, his old buddy John McEnroe’s playing.
“Oh look, he is recording what Johnny is saying.” He pointed to the guy who was recording the speed of the serve.
People around us gave that look.
I have thin skin, did not want to sit with hilly belly.
So I told the sister-in-law the guy was recording the speed of the serve.
That relationship didn’t go too far. It had nothing to do with Irene. Because years later he tried to date her again but the sister-in-law said
“I don’t think so. He has not demonstrated any sincerity.”
About 10 years ago, the sister invited us and her older sister to meet her boyfriend Michael. We had dinner in South Street Seaport.
Michael was a white boy from Texas, product designer by profession. We liked him a lot, handsome, polite and laid back.
But it was the wrong race.
She never took him to meet her parents, was afraid not meeting her mother’s expectation.
“I won’t bring him to see Ma unless he proposed.”
Hmmmmm … I think you got the order wrong.
The sister wanted to get married and have children.
Few years ago, she brought her current finance to us. After few visits to us, she began to bring him to her parents’ home.
It’s been good 4 or 5 years.
Last year, one day I took my mother-in-law shopping. On the way back, she wondered out loud innocently when would her daughter get married.
“I told her not to be so picky. ..”
I felt so sorry for the sister.
We are all so happy for her now that she is engaged. Today at dinner we talked about it, making plans.
“But he isn’t Chinese.” Pumpkin pointed out.
My heart sank.
“Why do you say so?” I never relay this story to my children.
“Oh, grandma said we have to marry Chinese.”
“She told you that too?!?!” I couldn’t believe my ears. They are my children. They should and could choose anyone they want.
“Yes.” Pumpkin relied evenly.
I just wanted to punch something or someone.
Pls keep that crap to yourself.
Stay off my children !!
“You know you can date anyone .. ” I began the motherly preach.
“I know mother dear” Pumpkin told me.
Really, does color matter? I don’t think so. Divorce rate is as high in China as in USA.
If the person my child is dating or marrying is decent and they’re in love, why do I care if s/he color purple or orange?
“Even he’s from Mars.” Golfer suggested.
There you go. That’ll do.
I spotted this almost a year old Next Magazine (#969, Oct 02, 2008) last week. One of the the cover stories caught my eyes:
69岁钢琴大师刘诗昆婚变. Liu Shikun was a youngster among Auntie Jennie’s colleagues. Indeed his first wife was the daughter of Ye Jianying 叶剑英, Ye Xiangzhen 叶向真.
The shocking value wasn’t he is divorcing his second wife (might have already done so by now), it’s how is being done: one of his young students is taking his side and fighting for his right, with his wife. She’s claiming that she isn’t the other woman but a righteous one.
不是第三者是正义者
Hmmmmm… says who? Who appointed her to be the justice?
I almost felt off the chair. The mentality of the two worlds couldn’t have been further apart. I found this young woman gravely offensive.
It’s really none of her business.
Meddling in other’s marriage is wrong. Well, unless you were in that bedroom.
Don’t we Chinese have a saying that goes .. 宁教人打仔不教人分妻?
The celebratory dinner was at
Pine Court Chinese Bistro
249-32 Horace Harding Expy
Little Neck, NY 11362
(718) 279-1999
Lou is the food connoisseur if not the epicurean. Dishes at Pine Court are mostly decent. Service was slow that night (wasn’t crowded), and the lamb chop was too salty. The fish soup was great.
We almost had the Ocean Six reunion at the tennis tourney: Lou and Simon were there; Larry came to be DQ’s groupie; only missing Clay.
The big babe tennis They’re all much taller than I’m, 5′6″ or 5′8″. When we take pictures, they tend to bend their knees so not to bury me. We had three tables about 30 people, mostly players and few spouses/friends/groupies.
I’m a Home Depot groupie.
Oh, talking about groupies, I had to share this.
First time I attended the tennis year end party, sitting at a single table because a widowed g/f wanted to meet someone.
As soon as I sat down, a middle aged man to my right introduced himself.
“I’m a podiatrist and single.”
No wonder he’s still single.
It didn’t take long for me to realize that many single women came because they perceived tennis players are loaded sugar daddies.
Sight.
I could only shake my head.
It turned out, the Dr. Single and I had a mutual friend: Art Gudeon, a little famed podiatrist I used to play tennis with. Art has an office in Rego Park and used to be on the medical staff at USTA during the Open. He’s a huge tennis bum, would camp out at the stadium two weeks straight every year.
Dr. Single joked,
“Is he still alive?”
Geee… seriously I don’t know. We haven’t been playing for few years.
Art is really fun to have around.
The war is playing out at Center Court in Wimbledon at the moment between 19 years old Sabine Lisicki, a German and choking artist and Number 1 Dinara Safina, 23 years old.
The German was serving for the set at 5:3.
But was unable, due to melt down.
Then she had the set point and missed an easy put away.
But no worry.
The Number One returned the favor instantly by double faulting.
Now they’re trading double faults and breaks, the play is just below the standard (it felt a high schooler could go out there and win) .. .. and … then there is Safina’s belly.
Man, that isn’t a pretty picture.
Aside from the pork belly hanging out, there is screaming, head banging, frustration in plain sight .. .. all from the current #1 ranked player who never wins a slam. Cool.
John McEnroe has bad temper on court, but that’s entertaining. The pork belly isn’t. It’s painful to watch, to a point of pity. Desperation produces lousy games.
This picture was taken on the way home from the CATsNY tourney last Saturday 6/27.
Oh man, oh man… Let’s see
- Gerald (or Gerard?)… oh Man, he taught me the serve
- Rain storm … Oh well, mother nature
- 陪了三个男人 … Oh Man
- A win … OH MAN
Queens College.
21 years ago.
A coach with soft Jamaican sing-song accent (he might not have accent at all … my hearing is going), long hair …
Dick and his sidekick Fred were taking lessons from him too. So I got to know Dick and big Fred.
I didn’t remember much but I credit Ger for my serve.
He made the motion as a swan.
“Just, like, a ballerina.” He repeated.
I haven’t seen him since.
Why Dick brought a coach as his partner?
Ger is the assistant principal at Bayside High; married to Susan, has two boys, 8 and 13. Oh man. He hasn’t changed much, except losing some of his hair.
He still looks fit and handsome but I didn’t get to play with him.
Given the fact how much rain we’ve seen here (hint: feeling like the The Hundred Acre Wood in Winnie-the-Pooh), the weather was awesome, cerulean skies with few clouds. I teamed up with Charlie Chiu against the Mengs; we won 6:2. Haven’t played with Charlie for a long time but we matched well. Xing ba 星爸 Tom was my original partner. Poor Tommy tried to wrestle out of this lousy arrangement by circling around Queens in angst. Finally out of consideration to Andy, he showed up at 11. We promptly put to work, playing the twin sisters.
There were two all women teams playing in the mixed doubles.
I was wrong. Tommy not only knows how to play singles but is a strategist and theorist also good at coaching too. But unfortunately we received a bagel. We had good time playing, 100% 阿Q精神.
… Then the downpour came.
The water began to wash the tiny little earth that was mattered to us only at the moment, out of nowhere. Did someone forgot to pray in the morning? Large part of the sky was still blue with sunshine.
Ha, good excuse.
Xing ba dashed off like a missile to Gulag. Yes, laboring there beats playing with Irene .
I was effectively got dumped.
No wonder the arranged marriage thing only worked in the past. 自由恋爱 is the way to go in the 21st Century.
The gang who organized the tourney perhaps felt bad for taking my money, so they arranged another an unsuspecting man, Jimmy Wang. I’ve seen him here and there but never played with him. Our first opponents were Josh and DQ. As we were warming up, Jim called me to the net and said,
“Don’t over kill. When you do that, you lose your forms.”
Ok Jimmo.
Jim seems to be a tacit man, mild mannered.
That’s good.
We went to work. It turned out, we matched pretty well. He saves all the balls that escaped me, which were often. We won 7:1. I lobbed quite a bit.
I always felt unsportsmanlike hitting to the weaker player when I have the control, which wasn’t often the case. But when a match is on the line, over the years, I have less and less qualm of doing so. It’s also out of consideration to my partner. Often I’m being the weakest link on the court I don’t really have to entertain such dilemma. Our next assignment was, well, against Mary and Paul. Pual Lin that was. Many players had whispered that Paul was the number one player [I assumed in NYS].
I saw Paul play for many years and hit with him, only once; ok twice.
Mary who likes to play with the guys only is considered the best female player in our group, a 4.0.
So, I took gulp. I already got a bagel. What could happen? Adding an egg? That’ll make a bicycle
Remember what Simon says?
I lobbed.
I lobbed.
I lobbed.
Sorry people. It DOES feel like cheating. I dislike this sissy stuff too. But I do want to win.
I also thought of Wah Zai’s comment that there is plenty of time [to set up a shot]. So took my time. Didn’t rush.
Didn’t Jimmo just say don’t overkill?
We were actually leading 3:0 till Irene served. I haven’t been able to serve regularly for a few months due to the pain in my shoulder. But for some reason, I was able to do half and under-armed the other half. It felt pretty funny.
Serve is a part of my game that’s dependable. The man who taught me well was there too. But I had to invent some way to serve otherwise, to avoid the pain and tenderness. Then it hurt other part of the arm, the inside muscle. Geee, I don’t even know there is a functioning muscle
There were some tense moments. We lost 2 games at deuce.
But we won at 5:3
OH MAN.
That’s huge for me.
I’ve never beaten Mary.
Thanks Jimmbo. Thanks Simon. And thanks Wah Zai.
Those 4 guys look slow on video – because the TV has trained or altered our eyes – but they’re 5.0 players. Well, I don’t know the pair but IF they challenged Tony, I would assume they’re 5.0 too.
Over all, it’s a great event and hope all had great time.
Andy didn’t get to play: 顾全大局 take the entire situation into account, he only watched. A decent skipper.
Respect is earned.
The tryout at the USTA for the upcoming US Open was held on June 25, more than 400 showed up. It just reinforced my believe that people who run the tennis events are less capable. The event’s scheduled at 3pm:
The registration begins at 3 p.m. and tryouts start at 4 p.m. at the USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center.
We arrived at 3pm. Immediately saw a friend of ours.
Go wait on line, out side of Court 7.
The line was huge.
Weather was extremely nice, bright sunshine and the sky was actually blue.
The line didn’t move a bit for the next hour except grow longer.
All I could think was …
‘Darn, we’re missing out on a dry day to play …’
Because New York has been raining a lot lately.
Global warming?
People watching?
At about 4pm, the skipper who ran the show walked briskly by. I tried to ask her if the birth certificate is needed (Charlie told me so but I forgot …).
She was very abrupt. “I can’t stop [walking].” She said and continued her walk.
I shout my question if birth certificate was needed.
She yelled abck:
“No, you don’t need anything to registier, today.”
The registration finally began.
Someone passed a single page of flyer to the waiting crowds that indicating the requirement. 14 years old and up are eligible to work there. Good.
Then why didn’t they pass the registration forms as well?
What they did was … every one passed by the first table to pick up a numbered card and was given a form to fill, then proceed to another row of tables, hunch over it to fill. All those could have been accomplished while they waited on line.
A huge sum of time was wasted.
They were like newbies, as if it was their first time to do so.
There were swamps of media on hand
Ok, I knew tennis is popular and there are huge populace stands at attention to be associated with it. But do they really have to (or want to) abuse fans’ good will?
We were in the middle of the line up. But Pumpkin got a card numbered 425. Clearly it’s a screw up. The twin sisters were there too, and more than 20 spots behind us. One of them had #418.
Many parents were complaining too.
They had few pro ball boys/girls demonstrated their crafts. This dream girl did the Center Court – not centerfold. She has the speed which the net ballperson needs. With a strong throwing arms, one could do the baseline.
We ran into many acquaintance aside from the twins.
Peter’s daughter was there.
Franklin was there with 3 of his buddies.
The two adults evaluator or recruiters took their time with each candidates (about 5 minutes), mostly kids, the very end.
Pumpkin was second to the last, 2nd of the twins. They explained the tasks and conferred with them. The two adults were patient. There were youngsters feeding the balls to the net and the tryouts try to copy what they saw earlier, or what they saw on TV since most of them are also tennis fans.
Having said the above, I wondered if it’s fair for all when the candidate is clearly not going to make it. I have no intention to embarrass anyone but do we have to watch her trying?
It was a very long day. We didn’t leave USTA till 7:20pm.
Ok, I’m overkilling this post with pictures.
SO … allows me here one more, just 1 more …
The Kodak moment came at the end: capturing my kids in the USTA is priceless ..
I never wasted a minute to say that I don’t like Jelena Jankovic, here is one more why …
…
After losing, Jankovic was ungraciously moved to suggest that Oudin isn’t one of them. As I said, the women do not quite reach the model comportment level of Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal.
Jankovic’s excuse was that she was wobbly from the heat — she required two medical timeouts — and the cyclical nature of “some woman problems.”
…
There are world number one players who have won slams – plenty of it – and, there are two recently minted #1 players who have yet to produce one … Geeeeeee … don’t they remind me of Jim Kelly (the QB of the Buffalo Bills): bridemaids. Gone to slam or Superbowl few times but never won one.
Btw, Irene doesn’t have ’some woman problems’ … It’s beyong me that she complains about it, competing at that level and blames girlie stuff? ISn’t Oudin a woman? To cite woman problem may suitable when you are facing a man, logically? What are the woman prbolems? Man has bad hair days too. Sour loser is more like it. Anyway … Glad to see Melanie Oudina, a 17 years old American is rising. You go girl … Take the world.
Many many years ago when the Williams sisters just began taking over the world, once during a mixed doubles match (a rarity!!), Chris Evert marveled at the power the sisters were dispensing.
“She’s over powering the men …” On both sides of the net.
Then she went on to say …
“During my time, we would just sit by the phone [till the man called for a mixed doubles game]; now they chose. …” I reckon the male players are flattered?
You go girls.
Girls Rule
IF anyone care to remember that Irene had, [pls note: past tense] a grand ambition, to reach the level 4.0. As being Irene, I have to say it’s not going to happen, any time soon. One I’m aging and two I’m lazy … let’s just hope that she obtains the 3.0 first.
So, tomorrow is our summer tennis tourney with 4 divisions:
Mixed Doubles
Men’s Doubles 3.0
Men’s Doubles 3.5
Men’s Doubles 4.0
And the committee decided to limit a player to only one event for easy court management.
So I figure IF I asked a guy to play with me, he’ll miss the real fun and challenge with the boys.
So I decided not to participate.
Seeing the registration getting a slow start, more warm bodies are needed, Irene felt obligated to help out. Ya right.
SO, no man called even I sat by the phone day and night.
SO, I called.
Rob: “Sorry my back hurt.”
Kenneth: “My leg hurt.” Guess I am no Barbie.
Bill: “Sorry … “ he’s hinding out in Europe.
Some popular woman here.
Some thick skinned woman here.
This morning I just found out that I’m in an arranged union. With Tom.
Tom.
The acer Tom?
The Tommy who has the meanest back hand?
The 6’5” Thomas who nails every single shot?
It turned out, the daddy Tom, father of a movie star.
Does Dad Tom even own a tennis racket? Sure the committee just wants my money
I first met him 5 years ago at a friend’s wedding. Then recently we reconnected at a dinner with mutual friends, the tennis buddies. I sat next to him.
After greeting and intro, he insisted that
“We’ve met before.”
Ok, whatev. I had no recollection at all.
Halfway though the dinner some one mentioned his star daughter, Lucy Liu, then a light bulb turned on.
He’s a sweet gent who always chats me up whenever we meet.
But tennis?
Hey, it might turn out that he’s as good as any other guy who carries Irene through the match.
What does Irene know? It’s a pure miracle that I manage to remember my name.
Allan St. John wrote in the current issue Maxim that back to 2004 when Murray, a Scot has won US Open boy’s title, British tennis officials decided to pay “the esteemed [Brad] Gilbert $1.5 million a year to coach him”, a future UK hopeful.
Interesting.
So far, he hasn’t won a slam (12 singles titles) but is ranked as high as #3 in May 2009. The commentators were amused to discuss the British press putting a cross on the face of the departing hometown players.
F is a 50 years old lady who spends 6 months in New York in the summer and 6 months in Florida. She puts up ads in craigslist and does well. F once offered her business to L, wanting L does it during her absent down in the south to keep her clients happy. Apparently L isn’t into it, and every times F returns to New York, her clients flock to her in no time.
L’s hubby tried it once while L watched. It’s a very exciting experience according to L. F knows how to handle it, keeping the man under her finger tips for a long time and eventually brings him to climax. It’s safe and clean.
.
