shits and giggles

Class of 2000

2011-09-10T20:35:00.016-04:00

I’ve been sitting on this for a minute. Well, ten years.

I’ve avoided writing anything down about my day on 9/11, I’ve thought about it a lot, but have resisted any urge to document my thoughts/feelings experiences that day. Heck, it's been a decade so here goes.

September 1990

“We’re going to be the class of 2000!“

It was 1990, we were all new to Hunter, a bunch of nerdy awkward seventh graders plucked from New York city’s five boroughs, all told that we were “intellectually gifted” based on our performance on a test that I hadn’t even really understood most of the questions to. Ever goal-oriented, we quickly figured out that we were the college class of 2000.

Wow, the class of 2000.

The first college graduating class of a whole new fucking millennium. What a big responsibility. It was a lot to take in as a 12 year-old. But I figured we had the next ten years of elite schooling to prepare ourselves for the awesome burden of leading humanity into a glorious new millennium.

September 2001

Ok, so I didn’t make it out as scheduled with the class of 2000. Though technically, the first year of the new millennium was really 2001, so in fact the class of 2001, really was the first class of the new millennium.

I had come full circle. I was back in New York City, after graduating from a fancy art school, doing a full-time internship at the Brooklyn Museum (then of Art)’s education department, less than a mile from where I had grown up, up the street from the library where I used to study, next to the Botanical Gardens my mom used to take me to and around the corner from the park where I used to play (and occasionally got robbed).

It was our first week of training and I was just getting to know my fellow interns, a really diverse talented group of people with a range of experiences in arts, culture and education. I was pretty excited to be out of an intense art studio environment, and immersed in thinking about teaching and learning through art with other people just as interested in the stuff as me.

I think it was the second or third day of the program. I got into work about 9:10. I took the 2/3 into Brooklyn from the 7 at Times Square, which meant my train probably rumbled right under the towers around when the first plane hit. Someone came in to our intern office and told us that a plane had flown into the World Trade Center.

I remember actually brushing it off in my head at first. I thought some amateur pilot had accidentally flown a small Cessna into one of the towers. This would have been in and of itself a horrible accident but I didn’t imagine anything near the scope of what was about to come next. So we waited for more news. Then someone checked cnn.com or the radio.

“It was a passenger plane that hit the tower.”

Oh shit I thought. “That’s fucking crazy, that building is going down.”

We all started making phone calls to family, friends. My parents were at home in Flushing when they heard the news and safe. My friends and I started circulating e-mails until we were all accounted for.

Once all of us as interns had accounted for our immediate people there wasn’t too much we could do. We barely knew each other; it was just our third day on the job together. We just sat and listened to the radio, listened to the accounts of people escaping the buildings making their ways north and east. I don’t even remember when each tower fell.

Around 11AM, the museum gathered the entire staff, about 200 of us, in the auditorium to be briefed by the museum’s security chief. He told us that most trains were running except the ones under the WTC. We were all free to leave, but he strongly urged us to stay at the museum for the time being for our safety.

He told us that he was part of a citywide security group that worked closely with the mayor to continually assess potential terrorist targets in the city. This team had created a master ranking of the 100 landmarks in New York City would be the most attractive to a terrorist attack.

He deadpanned:

“We are not on that list.”

The entire auditorium suddenly broke into laughter.

It pierced the tension and fear, amid the death and horror, to be gently reminded that we were just the Brooklyn Museum. This was still before Brooklyn became as white and hip(ster) as it is today and we were still a second-class citizen among NY's major cultural institutions. To be able to laugh about it together in solidarity was a small bit of humor on a terrible day.

We hung around the museum a little longer, but we were getting antsy. I just remember how damn helpless we all felt so went down to Methodist Hospital to try to give blood. (Across the street from where I grew up and where my mom would have been working if she hadn’t been off that day). Walking down Eastern Parkway towards Park Slope we saw the incredible exodus of people who had walked across the Brooklyn Bridge and had marched up Flatbush Ave. People looked dirty and exhausted. It was a massive line of people just marching away from lower Manhattan.

I heard people, covered in soot, responding with typical brash Brooklyn/New York fierceness/attitude, cursing at whoever had the nerve to start this shit. It was another necessary funny/bizarre moment on a horrible day.

“You want to start some shit?”

“You gonna come here with that shit?

“We will fuck you up….”

Brooklyn, I knew then I would always love you.

We heard on the radio that the city had set up massive triage centers and we thought that hospitals all over the city might be flooded with injured victims. But the hospital didn’t need us or our blood. As the day progressed it became clear that there weren’t going to be too many people injured.

So from there we walked around the corner to an apartment in a brownstone that a fellow intern was subletting. It was a beautiful Brooklyn brownstone and we went to the roof.

I’ll never forget what a beautiful day it was. The sky was so clear, blue and sunny. We could see the smoke rising from across the water.

Normally, this would be one of the most beautiful Brooklyn experiences, sitting on a roof of a gorgeous brownstone in the heart of Parke Slope on a beautiful sunny day under a blue sky, watching the city skyline in the distance.

But this was making me sick.

I don’t remember what we did the rest of that afternoon. We talked, about what I don’t fucking remember. As the day got later we all decided to go home. Subways into Manhattan weren’t running but we heard they were running out of the Atlantic Ave/Pacific St stop in downtown Brooklyn. I walked down with Joe, another intern. We walked down Seventh Ave. and down Flatbush to the station.

This late in the day, the streets were pretty deserted; most of the exodus was done. It was just Joe and I walking down the street and a ton of squad cars and police officers.

I wondered if we looked suspicious, walking towards lower Manhattan and not away from it, the only non-emergency personnel on the street. Then Joe said something out of the blue while we were walking down Flatbush that’s stuck with me for years.

I kind of want to see someone trying to do something, so I can stop them. I just want to tackle someone.

It seemed ridiculous, but I’d actually been feeling the exact same thing. I’d been scanning the streets of Brooklyn while we were walking hoping in vain to see someone doing something nefarious, someone plotting and scheming. I wanted to foil a plot, throw my body on a bomb, beat the shit out of someone, scream for the cops before something else got blown up.

I desperately wanted to do something useful, to stop something else horrible from happening. I didn’t want to be some macho superhero and I’m pretty sure neither did Joe. We just wanted to do something, anything, to save someone, anyone.

In the months after 9/11, I would, on my commute home, in some weird masochistic desire to immerse myself in more hate, buy the New York Post (it was only a quarter) flip right to the op-ed section and thoroughly read the editorials, the letters to the editor and all of the opinion columns. It was like I wanted to drown myself in the worst of the most extreme reaction, the violence, the urge to hit back in the worst possible ways. I wanted to intensely feel the coming inevitable escalation of death and violence.

What a decade

Back in seventh grade, I thought about the awesome responsibility my generation would have, the class of 2000 to usher in a new millennium of peace, prosperity, and justice.

Looking back it seems like us then twenty-year olds have done a pretty shitty job of kicking off this millennium. We couldn’t stop two more or less illegal wars, couldn’t prevent arguably the most disastrous presidential tenure in our nation’s history, didn’t leverage one of the most horrific attacks on domestic US soil to build stronger unity or global goodwill and let our country become more of warmongering bully. We let countless people (mostly poor and black) drown and wallow in New Orleans. We let our national pastime devolve into an inelegant game of ogres drawing walks and crushing homers (ok, maybe this doesn’t quite rank). Oh and we allowed byzantine “financial engineering” to devastate poor and middle class homeowners across the country.

Has my generation been asleep at the switch???

It’s been a good decade too and I shouldn’t be all negative. But when I look at the broad picture of what horrendous time we’ve had, it’s shocking and I weirdly feel responsible.

Now in my old(er) age I am more and more embracing the need to support the next generation so they can really start to get some shit right. That’s hitting me now more than ever as I fast approach my departure from the 18-34 demographic.

I’ve spent my 20’s more comfortable working at a micro level, I’ve never been interested in trying to confront systems directly, I always just wanted to roll up my sleeves and be in the(a) community. Governments and policy makers and bureaucrats be damned, I was just going to do my thing with the 5, 10, 20 kids that I could work with, and find ways that we could do that work on our own terms and carve out places for ourselves like 7ARTS or New Urban Arts.

The pounding the pavement thing with signs and parades and shit was never my thing, though I supported and believed in the importance, no necessity, of that activism as well. But I was never on some take-over-a-building, overthrow the government type shit.

Now I'm wondering if that head-in-the-sand mentality has been the best thing...

But… I have always sincerely believed that community revolutions happen in all kind of places and through all kind of actions and practices and I always, maybe naively, thought that the act of every young person I made art alongside and asked questions alongside was as much as a revolution as anything else.

Maybe the next step for me is taking my head out of the sand and looking at the bigger picture a little bit more. Figuring out the interconnectedness of it all. Connect what I’ve been so fiercely committed to practicing in my life to the why.

Forward ever backwards never right?

Stakes is (still) high.

Books off my shelf

2011-02-02T20:51:00.007-05:00

It's my three-year anniversary at New Urban Arts and being in Providence. I always get a little reflective around this time of year. A New Urban Arts alum who is about to finish her MPA (wow!) recently asked me for some suggestions for books on management and leadership that she could review for a class.

I've been a little delinquent in the reading department but I have been doing a lot of thinking about leadership so I moseyed over to my bookshelf and pulled a few books off my shelf that I've been thinking about:

The Impossible Will Take a Little While. A classmate of mine from NYU Wagner recommended this to me and honestly, I haven't yet read the whole thing, but it has some great essays and stories. It's a helpful reminder that social justice is a loooong road and a reminder to stay the course. It was also where I read Sherman Alexie's beautiful, comic and inspiring story Chocolate Thunder for the first time.

Small Giants. Again, another book I haven't actually finished (see a trend?). This is a great collection of case studies of private companies that chose not to go public and expand rapidly, to not compromise their unique values, culture, relationships and commitment to quality. It's also a great set of examples of how organizations can evolve in more interesting and creative ways than simply seeking to serve more and more customers/clients. It's reminder to be cautious about the blind pursuit of growth without deeply understanding what made you great in the first place...

"The wise leader is like water."-The Tao of Leadership

Siddhartha. I've been thinking about the need to learn through experience, both as individuals and organizations evolve.

Don't call this community organizing

2010-06-11T09:10:00.001-04:00

I'm getting a little aggravated by these corporate/grant/nonprofit programs that ask you to get your constituents to vote on shit, especially through social media. They call it "crowdsourcing" or an opportunity to "organize" or "galvanize" your constituents but it's for the most superficial reasons/purposes (a prize, a small grant from some corporation, a higher-star rating on some meaningless charity watch).

I'm no community organizer, but community organizing I figure should be about organizing people for something significant. Or more importantly, for a goal that the community has decided itself is important, not for some carrot being dangled by some other entity.

Lets organize our people for some real shit.

Nonprofits of all shapes and sized have worked VERY hard to earn the trust, committment, goodwill, and tireless devotion of our communities of constituents (donors, volunteers, members, participants/clients etc etc).

In fact, it's our most important and powerful asset and we have to be careful about HOW and WHEN we leverage it and for what PURPOSE.

We also shouldn't UNDERVALUE it. There may be no easily identifiable dollar value for our human capital but I'll bet Chase and Pepsi have a good sense of what access to our passionate constituents are worth and that their internal dollar valuations is WAY higher than the prize money they are offering out in their campaigns.

So don't ask us to blow human capital and goodwill on some of your bullshit marketing or some superficial campaign. Nor should we fall into that trap, not at least without demanding more collectively.

And certainly not for some crumbs from the table. Certainly not to get people to just vote for their favorite nonprofit to get some piddling grant money, especially when the grant money is peanuts compared to the resources of the corporations giving them out. If I'm going "galvanize" my community it's not going to be for getting YOUR seal of approval or for some tiny grant but for some real change and justice.

We have to stop selling ourselves short. We don't have a ton of fixed or financial assets but we have human ones and it's worth A LOT more than what we're presently giving it up for as a sector....

Discuss.

February 23 "El Alcalde Del Barrio"

2010-02-08T19:49:00.003-05:00

Really excited about this album, I've been listening to all the Joe Cuba I have. I love this animation on the Fania website (if you're reading this on facebook, you'll have to go to the original post to see the embedded video). The album also got a shout in the NY Times last Sunday.

It’s New York City music of incredible joy, crossover-minded down to its foundations.

Damn. Damn.

2010-01-16T12:35:00.003-05:00

this will play right into Obama's hands. He's humanitarian, compassionate. They'll use this to burnish their, shall we say, 'credibility' with the black community -- in the both light-skinned and dark-skinned black community in this country. It's made-to-order for them.-Rush

George W. Bush certainly didn't risk creating the appearance that he was shamelessly pandering to the black community during Katrina? That worked out pretty well huh?

Fuck you Rush.

To his credit, Dubya stressed today:

“I know a lot of people want to send blankets or water,” said Mr. Bush, who looked tan and chipper. Then he flashed a familiar grin, as he echoed what relief efforts have been saying for several days: “Just send your cash.” (NY Times)

From professional experience and everything I've been reading, cash is way more helpful than in-kind gifts of stuff in this situation (no disrespect to the many in-kind donors to New Urban Arts...).

After a very unscientific due diligence process (I did fb and twitter call for suggestions and checked websites)I made a gift to Partners in Health. Mainly, I was looking for 1) organizational credibility (has the org been doing this stuff, were they recommended by people I trust etc.) and 2) a holistic approach that provides direct relief and incorporates some form of broader community/grassrooots development (essentially empowers/organizes/involves local communities as much as providing "relief"). From what I read, PIH seems to integrate the two tightly. They were the "big-name" agency who's approach gave me the most hope for a more systemic lasting change.

There is a lot of things to say/think/ruminate on with all the commentary flying around the news, blogs, twitter, etc. etc. that I've been reading. This is probably the most real-time documented/analyzed tragedy we've seen (but I guess as tech evolves, we'll just keep saying that about each next one though...).

All I can say now is that this just makes me want to weep and grieve. I can give (some) money, and probably will keep doing so. Damn, damn, damn.

"Planned serendipity"

2009-12-05T11:39:00.006-05:00

I listened to Rich Harwood's Craiglist Foundation podcast last night while running (and a little walking!). I've taken to listening to podcasts when I run so I can do some professional development as I exercise and the craiglist bootcamp podcasts have been a great set of source material and about the right length for an hour+ run.

I'd never heard of him before but I pulled out these lines in his Q and A section that I really liked:

I think that's how most change is created. It emerges. I wrote something called "planned serendipity" and what we found in all the change efforts that we looked at us was that the most important thing was to be really ruthless about the conditions you create for change.

But then a lot of the change was serendipitous.

There is a discipline in thinking about how is it that you focus on the conditions that you can create. Where do you have some influence and effectiveness?

If you're creating the right conditions, then you're much more likely to have serendipitous things to pop up.

A few years ago, I did a two-day facilitative leadership workshop (I should revisit all those materials now as a now not-so-rookie nonprofit executive) my main take-away was when they talked about "empowerment."

The facilitator said to us (I'm paraphrasing him) "you don't empower people, because that implies you're giving someone power that you have. You're creating conditions so people can empower themselves."

Peter Hocking's interview on Design Sponge describing New Urban Arts (emphasis mine) echoed this to me:

New Urban Arts operates more like a professional studio – enabling learners and practitioners to follow an idea, impulse or line of inquiry in a way that enables discovery and unanticipated learning.

I love his description of the conditions being created and his nod to serendipitous "unanticipated" learning.

This balance is something I'm thinking about a lot. It's critically important to vision, to backwards plan, to know what "results" you want (and the ruthless creation of conditions will be an expression of this intentionality.) but it's just as important to always be making space (lots of space) and staying on the lookout for the unpredictable.

Arts Career Panel and Networking Thursday

2009-11-11T12:15:00.001-05:00

Arts and Culture Career Panel at NYU Wagner
I will be in New York City on Thursday evening to speak at NYU Wagner's Fall 2009 Panel on Careers in Arts & Culture (Wagner is where I went to graduate school).

The other panelists are Kenita Lloyd (MPA ‘09), Deputy Director for the Museum for African Art, and Mark Rossier, Director of Development and Marketing for the New York Foundation for the Arts. The Panel is scheduled for Thursday, November 12, 2009 from 5:30pm to 7:00pm at the Puck Building’s Mulberry Conference Room [295 Lafayette St, 3rd Fl., New York, NY 10012].

This event is open to the public so please spread the word to anyone you think might be interested in this. Or feel free to check it out if you're interested.

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Puck Fair 7:30 on...
Then feel free to join me with friends and other education, youth, arts and related do-gooders at Puck Fair across the street:

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Jason Y.

Philly

2009-09-01T20:32:00.023-04:00

I took a day trip to Philly and did the self-guided mural tour courtesy of the Philadelphia Mural Arts Program. They have a great self-guided walking and driving tour map you can download here. I also had a chance to check out what looks will be an interesting exhibit at the Painted Bride (Semilla Arts Collective) and visit the very nice new Asian Arts Initiative space.

Stephen Colbert Makes Me Cry

2009-07-22T00:56:00.005-04:00

I laughed so hard...

On "reverse civil rights leader" Pat Buchanan saying "white men...were 100% of the people who died at Gettysburg and Vicksburg"

"Yeah! Where were the black guys during the civil war? C'mon..."

On Obama's speech to the NAACP:

"Especially since his [Obama's] tough love message for the banking and auto industries took the form of shooting money at them from a t-shirt cannon."

To Geoffrey Canada:

"If it wasn't for white people discrimination wouldn't have ended because we had to give it up. Your welcome by the way."

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Reverse Racism

www.colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor

Mark Sanford

Rest in Peace Michael Jackson

2009-07-07T17:47:00.008-04:00

Who gives a fuck?
Plenty of people have made this point during the insane MJ coverage. Insane is a good word for anyone that can temporaily shut down twitter and google. I'm normally the most anti-celebrity mourning person out there; the first to say this is just colonialism manipulating our little minds into ignoring real injustice in the world. In particular, the excessive attention paid to Princess Diana and JFK junior too me were examples of our celebrity-obsessed culture. We were mourning people who had everything, absolutely everything, who had come from the most obscene privilege, living lives as elites that most of the masses who mourned them would never come close to grasping. And in death, they would distract us from thinking critically and organizing around other important issues.

I seethed each time at the lopsidedness of everything.

But I do.
I couldn't believe how sad I was this time. What makes MJ different? Well, a lot obviously (talent, accomplishments, and upbringing just to name a few), but the essential question is, why does someone like me care about someone like him?

Wait, maybe I can intellectualize it?
Maybe I can tie MJ's passing to some form of social justice. Did MJ make Barack Obama possible? Was it important that he made MTV accept black music? Did he make people of color, African Americans love themselves in new ways, find places for themselves in America that people of so many different backgrounds have been struggling for? I don't really know. Those questions and discussions are above my pay grade. Though I'm happy to read any essays/articles on the topic(s)....

But wasn't he a (possible) child molester and do other messed up stuff?
Picasso was a womanizer. Legend says that Rembrandt was so miserly that his studio assistants painted gold coins on the ground to trick him into trying to pick them up. And he probably passed off their work as his own. These are just some of the examples off the top of my head of great artists who were far from great people. And I don't know if MJ was child molester. A saint or sinner? I don't care to really try to parcel it out. For me, it's not the point. I'm not sad because the world lost a "good" man-though to people close to him, I'm sure he was.

It's all just fucking irrational. Accept it.
Damn straight. It didn't seem to make sense for my mom, a Korean immigrant who toiled as a nurse for 30 years to care when someone of JFK Jr.'s privilege died. Let me have my celebrity sadness!

Someone I feel a connection to as illogical as it may be...

I'm sad because this was part of my childhood. I memorized the words to Beat It, I sang along not even understanding the damn words. My parents gave me the tape of Thriller I think for my birthday and played it constantly. I had no idea what any of the lyrics were about. All I knew was that Michael Jackson, and singing his songs as a little chubby, geeky Asian kid with glasses that were way too big, hair that was way to bowled, pants that were too damn tight, felt like about the most American thing I could be/do. Growing up in Park Slope, as one of the few (then) Asian kids navigating a mostly white gifted elementary program and a fairly diverse neighborhood, Michael was a cultural common denominator.

I guess selling 20 million-some records will do that.

Of course, as he descended into more and more weirdness and I started branching off into other music he became just another relic of my childhood and I stopped paying attention to him. More recently, as I got into dance, I gained a new appreciation for him as an artist and performer, not just the guy who sang all those songs I memorized as a kid. I watched a lot of him dancing. I had done enough dance classes and tried to (late in life) force my body to do enough (for me) unnatural things that I appreciated how effortlessly he moved, how captivating, just one guy could be on stage in front of thousands...

So does any of this make sense? I don't know, I don't care. We're all masters of our own contradictions. Rest in peace, Michael. Thank you.

Highline

2009-07-06T22:42:00.011-04:00

I never thought I would walk on these tracks. What a beautiful public space.

Fun with Unitards.

2009-04-20T11:55:00.004-04:00

From pin the salsa on the Jason

Happy birthday

2009-03-29T18:35:00.001-04:00

Beautiful picture from today's NY Times.

Clawback

2009-03-01T20:58:00.013-05:00

Merit Pay for teachers?
When I taught elementary school one of the ideas that got kicked around was a bonus pay system tied to student achievement. It was our first year and we were a start-up charter school and this was 2002, years before Mayor Bloomberg started a pilot bonus program in the DOE . It was just a proposal that the then-Director proposed in a staff meeting (I don't know what the school has done since), but incredibly controversial even as just an idea. Some of the reasons teachers protested were:

Difficulty assigning credit (what percentage of increases in student achievement to to the receptionist, the classroom teacher, the subject teachers etc.)
How do you account for where students are when you have them and other factors beyond a teacher's control?
Does it change the way people teach (e.g. ignoring high and low achievers in favor of the students who were right near the threshold of meeting standard)

Not spoken as explicitly, but very clear in the tone of my fellow teachers' responses was indignation that they needed more money to be motivated to do more, to be better.

Teachers in general are a pretty intrinsically motivated lot, teachers at our charter school, who had given up union protections and other benefits for higher pay, but longer hours, more independence in exchange for higher accountability were probably even more so intrinsically motivated. They didn't like the idea of adding this aspect of competition to a job they felt they already did professionally.

The Right Carrots
One basic law of economics is that people respond to incentives. I don't remember too much from micro, but that seemed like a pretty important one.

We also talked a lot about intrinsic and external motivation in Joe Magee's intro class Managing Public Service Organizations. By and large, those of us in the public sector are motivated intrinsically, by the desire to do a good job to simply do good.

The most interesting part of the incentives discussion we had was the role of money as an external incentive. Magee pointed out that people rank money very high as an incentive (typically top 5), but it is not number one. There are other more important incentives (if I only remember what they were!). But interestingly, we perceive importance of money to be higher to others than in ourselves. In other words, we assume other people rank money as higher as an incentive than we do ourselves. Which leads to us assuming that money is a more effective incentive than it really is (again, this is matter of degrees and relativity, money is probably an effective incentive). This is not to say people don't want to be compensated fairly and even generously, but it may be dangerous to assume that money is the most effective incentive for all employees in all sectors in all situations.

Clawbacks
So I've been fascinated by the idea of clawbacks. What's the simplest argument against performance pay for teachers? That measuring their success (the education and development of a human being) is hard to measure quantitatively and perhaps even harder to fairly assign credit for. But not so for people in the business world supposedly. Performance is tied to things like shareholder value, revenue generated, seemingly straightforward numbers that are easy to trace.

But I've been reading about "clawbacks", first in reference to the Bernie Madoff scandal, but more recently in reference to employees who's actions may have led to short-term gains (enough to trigger bonuses), but were actually really bad for the long-term health of the firm. The problem is that these consequences didn't occur until long after they had left and earned their bonus(es):

Clawbacks are more common among private-equity firms and hedge funds, essentially giving the employer an insurance policy in case trades or deals come back to haunt the firm. In a memo Monday, Morgan Stanley Chairman and Chief Executive John Mack announced that an unspecified portion of year-end bonuses for eligible employees will be "subject to a clawback provision that could be triggered if the individual engages in conduct detrimental" to the Wall Street company.
"We're making what we see as a good-faith effort to more closely tie employee ompensation to longer-term performance," said Morgan Stanley spokesman Mark Lake.

Wall Street Journal

“Poorly structured pay packages encouraged the get-rich-quick mentality and overly risky behavior that helped bring financial markets to their knees and wiped out profits at so many companies,” said Amy Borrus, deputy director at the Council of Institutional Investors. “And yet many of these C.E.O.’s have pocketed enormous compensation.”

New York Times

I'm no finance expert but it seems like a lot of the destructive financial engineering we're experiencing came as a result of incentives that didn't take long-term sustainability acct.

How do we make sure our incentives are tied to the long-term health of students, schools and communities? Can we?
What would clawback provisions in a teacher and school performance pay structure look like if their short-term gains horribly corrupted a school's and a student's lifelong performance?

How complex would these performance structures have to be? Wall Street can't get this right and their performance measures seem much simpler.

Some examples of the educational equivalent of this is pumping up test scores through a variety of less than optimal educational means ranging from the legal, but not so ideal, focusing on test prep rather (junk food), ignoring content area instructional (science, history, the arts music etc), cutting out recess and physical education, to the straight-up illegal (re-bubbling your students test scores like in Freakonomics).

Clearly, a lot of this financial engineering ignored the long-term health of a lot of financial institutions and investors. What happens if we build in performance-based bonuses for teachers and school principals that encourage short-term gains at a long-term cost? When kids, years later, when they have the freedom to do so, drop out of school because they hate school, or when they continue and they enter middle and high school and are completely ill-quipped to navigate their learning environment. Can't do research independently, can't ask critical questions?

Maybe the most sobering thing I ever head about public high school from a former teacher was, "it's actually not so bad [compared to teaching elementary school], by the time [they] get there, the ones who are showing up actually on some level want to be there. The really bad ones just don't even show up."

What triggers clawing back that bonus money?

The question I have is essentially--

how is what we're learning in this financial meltdown about incentives and compensation packages applicable to the debates about how we treat educators, schools and their role in student success?

Discuss.

What the fuck pisses you off about the world?

2009-02-20T21:22:00.010-05:00

This month is career panel season in Rhode Island or something. I've participated in my second career panel this month (RISD and RI Campus Compact) and I think I'll be doing another one next month (Brown) and I turned down another one because of scheduling conflicts (Leadership RI).

It's funny being at a point in my "career" where I've reached a stature ("Nonprofit Executive Director" sounds pretty good on paper huh?) where I'm supposed to have words of wisdom for college students interested in careers in the public sector. I'm trying to be careful not to let all this stuff go to my head and fall into the "professor trap" of being the wise old grizzled vet with all the answers.

I told one young woman today that it was easy for me to look back at the jobs and organizations I've worked at and retroactively impose a clear and logical narrative. But the reality is that my "career" has really been a series of accidents, luck and opportunity mixed in with a little bit of my vague sense of anger at the way things are in the world and wanting to somehow to do something about it, however small.

Hopefully, I helped her chill out and be more zen about how her career will unfold. It's easy to look at other people and see logic, order and a natural progression. But you can't believe the hype! Sometimes you just have to be the gourd in the river.

In addition to being a panelist today, I led a group of 15 college students who are involved in RI Campus Compact. These are students from colleges all across Rhode Island, who are involved in a variety of service-related work. This summit was an opportunity for them to network with each other and meet some professionals doing public work (like me).

In my experience, as much as I don't like to say it like this exactly, a lot of us doing this work are motivated by a deep sense of anger, of some (or many) injustice in the world and a desire to address that. I heard about one nonprofit that actually had "anger" as one of their criteria in looking for a new executive.

I'm not sure if I was supposed to take this approach, but instead of getting into the nuts and bolts of the jobs I've had and the skills I look for when hiring people, I just asked--

"what drives you to do the work that you do? What makes you angry? What's wrong with this world as it is? What do you want to do about it?"

Maybe I shouldn't have framed it so negatively or in such a deficit-based way, or even framed them as world fixers, but man, was I inspired by the passion and sense of justice that moved these students! Some of the things that came up was,

Ignorance, the way we fail to acknowledge our unconscious biases towards each other.
Bikes, that learning to repair, ride and own our own bicycles can free you from dependence on a consumer culture, make a healthier society
Religious faith as source of motivation to make the world a better place and frustration that religious Christians and Catholics just get dismissed as "Jesus freaks"
Starting a pre-school literacy program and because just a few extra hours by a well-trained volunteer can make all the difference between the reading skills of a child from a low-income family compared to a wealthier one
Ignorance about issues such as Abu Ghraib and the middle east. Distorted and biased media coverage about Israel and Palestine.

We talked about how hard it was to put these things into words, into clear action steps. I tried to stress them that it was ok. That it was ok to be vague, to be confused, to be unable to clearly articulate what it was that moved them, but to continue to talk about it. New Urban Arts exists because Tyler started something that he couldn't quite put into words. He spent 10 years trying to put words around a way of doing teaching and learning that didn't quite exist when he started.

I selfishly framed the discussion to these young people this way because, having just passed my own one-year mark, I am asking myself this same question to re-center myself.

What the fuck pisses me off so much that I do this work?

Disclaimer, this is not a complete, nor well-thought out list. Some of these bullets are ill-thought out, simplistic, maybe irrational and maybe even unfair characterizations. But this is me doing the same exact thing I asked these students do today, which is to messily, and clumsily talk about what makes me angry:

That we say some people are creative and others aren't
That we privilege the stories of some people over others and art is ultimately, to me, about stories and excluding narratives is essentially denying the humanity of others.
That teaching and learning too often breeds dependency. Dependency on others (people like authority figures or things like test scores) to tell you that you are smart, talented, gifted whatever. And as much as this dependency gets bred across the socioecononmic scale, even in priveleged schools and elite colleges and institutons, this definitely happens way too much more to poor young people and people of color
That we condition people to wait. To wait to be told what to learn, what to do, what matters. Fuck waiting. Do. Make your own criteria, do your own thing. This is maybe what I love about New Urban Arts the most. Our young people don't sit around and wait.
That all this shit serves to psychically oppress people.
That making art, being encouraged to create, can change this but may be why it really doesn't happen enough. That we'll liberate too many people if we radically change this shit.
People who run soul-killing schools for poor inner-city youth that they would never send their own children too and justify it by saying that "I wish we could be more creative and hands on like [the name of the fancy private school my kids go to] but we can't because these kids are so deficient." Yes, I heard a charter school's board member say this in a meeting with me and not even blink (no school I've ever worked with thankfully).
And so much more...

This stuff probably isn't going in the need statement, problem-to-be solved section of a grant application anytime soon.

But I do think its important to time to time, to try to find that anger in you to channel it.

7ARTS

2009-02-12T21:47:00.006-05:00

I just passed my one-year anniversary as the Executive Director of New Urban Arts.

Holy shit it went by fast.

It's also been about a year and a half since I ended 7ARTS, the program that was my heart and soul for a good four years of my life.

In the last year in Providence, I've deliberately avoided looking back at my old 7ARTS documents. I mean, I've been kind of busy, transitioning into a new position and city. But really, I didn't want to remind myself that I stopped something I loved and force myself to think about what could have been maybe if I had been better, smarter, more organized, if I could have been more anything more than what I had been.

Bored at home tonight, I started browsing through my old files, everything from recommendation letters, to program plans, to interviews with potential funders, students. I saved a ton of shit electronically from those four years. It's an amazing archive for me to look at. An electronic record of my failures and successes in folders, subfolders and sub-sub-folders.

It's weird, I'm only 30, so I guess I'm pretty young still (kind of), but reading though my old files I feel like some grizzled world-weary nonprofit veteran looking back at myself as some naive young dumb passionate kid, trying to start some new program that would "change the world".

"Easy there rookie..." I feel myself saying as I read all this old shit.

I guess what I'm saying-it's easy for me to look back now and see where I screwed up, where I should have eased up and where I should have put much more energy. I see what I did that was so smart in some places, and incredibly dumb in others. To use the sports analogy, my court vision is a lot better than it was just a few years ago, hopefully I still have enough of the youthful enthusiasm (athletic ability and hops!) to balance it all out before my body gives out completely.

So in no order and no system, here are some things I'm looking at....

Brain Fart 2/16/06
The one thing we primarily work towards is that when our kids have an idea or spark there are concrete steps they can take to make that idea happen. So many time people and kids especially have an idea a thought and it just dissolves or they put it away in their pocket. Our space gives them an opportunity and the belief that they can make that idea into something tangible. It’s so important to becoming an artist but not only that but any kind of transformation and social change. You have to believe that you can make something happen. I have kids calling me saying-“I thought of an idea for my next project” and I realize that their excitement is that they have a space where that idea, that spark, can become something, a space where people will listen to them and give them feedback on their idea is something they wouldn’t otherwise have. Isn’t this how social change or any change begins? By believing that the things you imagine can actually be?

[So much of this time period-2003 to 2006-for me was trying to figure everything out that I was trying to do and put in language funders could "get", tangible language. When I had this brain fart, I got really excited because it helped me understand a little more clearly why I loved doing 7ARTS (and New Urban Arts years ago and now) so much. Not that this is great grant language-no social venture fund ever seemed to ever find this thinking compelling but whatever...]

My notes from conversation with Melissa Krinzman of Venture Architects:

You have a program that has a history of support (financial and institutional)

Strategy build on existence and support for your program
Have an existing program
Have 2-5 year old project
X # of students
Kind of program
Goal-take this successful program and take it to the next level

ID a space housing artists
Existing programs
Unique environment based on research in the area
Direct access to artists to in their studio environment

What’s unique about it-learning environment-Art school
Resources+mentorship+peers+working space+knowledge and experience=a meaningful creative experience

[Through a social entrepreneurship student group at Wagner I got a free consultation with Melissa Krinzman, a consultant to start-ups. Surprisingly, she was actually very positive about the 7ARTS' model and approach and importance of it. Of course-she wasn't quite sure where the funding would come from! Neither was I.]

Student phone conversation

I never did writing like that before e.g. free writing. Certain topics that I never got to write about e.g. poems about my parents, my neighborhood, picking our own topics.

I liked the art class because it wasn’t a “class” but more of a “session." Its a class where I get to do what I want. You’re not like a teacher but a mentor that gives advice and not directions and instructions, not telling us what to do.

Nothing to fix.

What do you tell your friends about the program?

“I tell them that there is a cool guy named Jason, he’s funny.” He asks us to write and draw about certain things. The class is fun, not serious. Not like the atmosphere of school. My writing improved. I applied for a job at Ecko and had to write a 3 paragraph essay. I focused less on “strategy" and more about thinking about expressing myself and writing about what I feel. My writing was honest.

[I wasn't that diligent about surveying and interviewing students in 7ARTS but one session we were good about it and got some really nice feedback. This student really did call me cool. To be honest, he meant funny/cool in a really kind of dorky way. That was (is) my schtick with youth.]

The Official 7ARTS Policy regarding fucked up shit that we hear from kids that we don't know how to respond to (I didn't really have an official name for this-I think I euphemistically called it "Health Outcomes"):

What is our responsibilities as youth-workers in a studio arts environment?

a. As artists we do not censor youth. Anything a kid says is fair game. A kid at 7ARTS should feel comfortable bringing up his/her substance use, lifestyle choice(s) etc. However if a kid says something offensive, hateful, dangerous or indicative of self-damaging tendencies we have a responsibility to confront the issue directly. It does not necessarily have to be at that exact moment. A delayed effective intervention is better than a knee-jerk poor one. We have a responsibility to respond in a reasonable amount of time with a thoughtful response consistent with how other responsible and effective youth/education organizations would. This is part of our education as an organization/program.

b. As youth workers we have a responsibility to promote healthy behavior and lifestyle choices when possible and to avoid endorsing or modeling dangerous or unhealthy behavior. This includes but is not limited to: unsafe sex, alcohol and substance use/abuse and physical or verbal violence.

[Man-I forgot how many conversations we had about this! I wrote this after talking to a number of people in different youth organizations, social workers etc. It never came up that much, but because 7ARTS was such a casual environment for our youth, things came up we never were quite sure how to deal with as "adult role models." I wrote this "policy", but it's still kind of vague and I never figured out what this policy should have looked like in our program. But the most encouraging thing I heard was from a social worker with 20 years of youth experience who told me that if we had students comfortable enough to talk openly about things like drug use, drinking etc. that they must feel comfortable around us and trust us so we must be doing something right. As awkward as it may be!]

Seriously

2009-01-28T13:38:00.000-05:00

Don't let the door hit you on your way out....

2009-01-22T01:38:00.002-05:00

C'mon everyone-hit me with captions to this great picture!

What Will They Be?

2009-01-19T13:06:00.003-05:00

Don't focus on what they are now, picture what they're going to be.

David Melendez (Rest in Peace), loosely paraphrased from Winsome Lee.

My old salsa instructor/director, Winsome Lee, told me about David Melendez's advice. Years ago, when she had just started teaching, she was having trouble getting students to stick in her class. Her mentor, David, suggested she start a student dance troupe. Instead of having auditions for dance professionals like a pro team, she would cherry pick students from her class who seemed like they had some talent and dedication and mold them into a dance troupe. It would give her students an incentive to work for, build a sense of community (a dance team to root for that your classmates are on) and be extra exposure for her.

It's a great strategy for building a more loyal student following. The problem is, a student team takes a lot of damn work and discipline! La Tormenta Oriental, (my old student team), I think I can safely say, has a strong reputation in the NY salsa community for clean, disciplined and energetic performances and I'm proud of having been a part of it. I didn't start with the team from the beginning. When Winsome asked me to join, Tormenta had already performed at several congresses and clubs and was already established. So I didn't fully experience the work that Winsome and Tormenta's founding dancers put in early on.

Winsome told me that she went to David for advice because she didn't know what to with the beginner dancers she had recruited. She couldn't imagine them ever being good enough to be on stage. "They cant even do double turns!" She was used to dancing and performing with pro dancers who didn't need as much care and attention. David told her:

Don't focus on what they are now, picture what they're going to be.

Great advice!

Suddenly, I understood her living that attitude in the way she ran our rehearsals, the excellence she demanded from all of us and her willingness to take on students/dancers like me who didn't have a ton of obvious talent, but worked hard. I looked back at our rehearsals and realized she didn't see our (my) bumbling off-count dancing, but was seeing what we'd eventually be on stage.

I've been thinking a lot about David's advice to Winsome as I close in on my one-year anniversary as the Executive Director of an organization where we focus on getting students to see/find their inner greatness when they may not see it themselves.

[Ironically, David also ran Starlite studios in the Bronx, a dance school in the Bronx just for kids. His passion was reintroducing Latino youth to their culture and heritage through Latin music and dance. I have no doubt that Starlite and David changed a lot of young lives for the better.]

I just spent the last weekend with Raj and his wife Nadia. Raj and I traded leadership challenges. We're both evolving into new roles and responsibilities. Raj, as the CEO and Founder of a rapidly-growing company, Charter School Business Management and me, as an Executive Director succeeding a popular founder at a beloved community arts organization.

Raj and I had both been successful in our past jobs by being the over-delivering "number 2." By working hard, executing and delivering. Moving into the "number 1" role has required a radical shift in our thinking. Our natural instinct has been to grind, to manage every project, to do things ourselves. Getting things done was what got us here right?

We talked about how crazy it's become, that the scripts have been flipped and our job is now to see everyone's greatness around us, everyone's leadership potential and and see what people can become, not get bogged down in what they are now while hoarding responsibility for ourselves.

I'm trying to remember all the people who gave me time and support necessary to grow and saw potential in me that I didn't see in myself. I told Raj that it seemed to me that one of Tyler's greatest strengths as a leader, was his ability/willingness to see leadership potential in people and his willingness to spend real time nurturing it. I mentioned myself and Simon at College Visions as two examples of people he encouraged over the years. I remember Tyler telling me years ago that he thought Simon and I were both great Echoing Green candidates and both had a lot of leadership potential. I was completely blown away that he saw us (or rather me) that way. It was high praise from him.

There's so much to do in a work day, calls to make, grant deadlines to meet, emails to send whatever, especially now, but I'm trying to remember that making time, formally and informally, for every college/graduate student, mentor, student, who ever, that wants to talk about their lives, careers, new projects, whatever, is an investment in New Urban Arts' future and its mission. And I have to make time for them because so many people have made the same time for me.

Because it's about what they're going to become and I have to see it, maybe even before they do.

Happy Martin Luther King Day everyone!

Randomness

2009-01-01T20:38:00.002-05:00

Found what looks like a shrine to Kenny G in the bathroom hallway of a Korean kimbap shop on Northern Blvd around 163rd St.

Peking Duck sandwich stand on Main Street in Flushing. They used to be $.75 a pop, but now they're a buck. Still worth it. Ultimate impulse food purchase. I get 2 or 3 at a time.

Imaginary Numbers

2008-12-13T22:59:00.004-05:00

This shit is crazy. Imagine, telling your employees that the whole enterprise is a lie. How do you maintain a ruse this freaking big for so many years (rhetorical question--I get how he did it in a general sense). Again, this shit is crazy. I can't stop reading about this.

Madoff stated that he was "finished," that he had "absolutely nothing," that "it's all just one big lie," and that it was "basically, a giant Ponzi scheme." In substance, Madoff communicated to the senior employees that he had for years been paying returns to certain investors out of the principal received from other, different, investors. Madoff stated that the business was insolvent, and that it had been for years. Madoff also stated that he estimated the losses from this fraud to be approximately $50 billion.
SEC Complaint

“The returns were just amazing and we trusted this guy for decades — if you wanted to take money out, you always got your check in a few days. That’s why we were all so stunned.”
NYTimes

Mr. Madoff, the founder and primary owner of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC in New York, was arrested and charged Thursday. Prosecutors allege that the 70-year-old Mr. Madoff hid losses, paying certain investors returns using principal he received from other investors. Prosecutors and regulators have yet to determine how much has been lost, or the amount in assets still held by Mr. Madoff's business.
Two of his investors said that among his clients, Mr. Madoff was considered a money-management legend; they would joke that if Mr. Madoff was a fraud, he'd take down half the world with him.
Wall Street Journal

Yes We Can?

2008-09-07T15:34:00.003-04:00

I made my first contribution to a political campaign. I'd been considering it, but this email from my friend and RISD classmate chino was the final kicker. He's been involved in producing this, and other videos, for the Obama campaign.

I've resisted giving to political campaigns for a number of reasons: general cynicism about politics, hesitant to be a "true believer" and ultimately, I don't like giving to multi-million dollar behemoths. The whole buckets-of-water-in-the-ocean thing. When doing fundraising (and I do a fair bit of it), I stress that I (we) are asking people to pay for us to do the good work they want to themselves, but don't have the time to do. It's not charity, but a mutually beneficial transaction. I know my $100 bucks will be spent by the Obama campaign before the gift is even processed, but personally, I do want to be involved this election cycle in a way that I haven't and I'm happy to pay for the work that chino and others are doing, because if I could, I'd like to be doing it myself. Oh, check out the shout-out he got from the big O himself!

Hello,

I know it has been a while since I may have been in touch with some of you.

About a month ago I moved to Chicago to join the Obama campaign staff. As part of the video team I have sifted through hundreds of videos documenting the grassroots movement made up of so many supporters throughout the nation. Many of these stories are short glimpses of the lives of supporters and how they have been inspired to take part in this campaign. I have to admit that each of these stories, at times, can be so moving that it is difficult to watch them back to back and not completely embarrass myself in the office by outright bawling. But I do it…pretty much every day.

The link below is for a video we made that summarizes the movement we have been privileged enough to witness. All of the footage and photographs have been submitted by supporters of this campaign (including the beautiful time-lapse sunrises), and it is a good snapshot into how many of these stories begin each day, in every town and city, in every state in America.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EcRA2AZsR2Q

I have never been actively involved in the political process in the past. I may have talked a big game at times, but I have never actually picked myself up and gone out to help in the process before. But this time is different.

I have started a fundraising page below and I encourage everyone to give as much as you feel comfortable with. Because it's not just the dollar amount we have collected, but rather, it is about how much we have taken ownership of this campaign -- how badly we want our voices to matter and be heard.

And if you don't decide to donate now, I would encourage you to find an event in your area that you can take part in and join the millions of people who want to make a difference in this election.

http://my.barackobama.com/page/event/search_simple

In the end, this election is not about Barack Obama, or Joe Biden, or even John McCain or Sarah Palin. It's about us and what we can do together to change this country.

Thanks for taking the time to read this far. I hope to see you all soon.

love,

chino

FUNDRAISING PAGE: http://my.barackobama.com/page/outreach/view/main/chinovian

As Apple Pie...

2008-08-24T20:43:00.002-04:00

Sometimes, I absolutely cannot believe Obama might win. I'm amazed that our country is open to the possibility and I admit, part of me feels a small twinge of national pride when I picture it.

But then, on the flip slide, I'm embarrassed at how much work he has to do to not seem so damn alien.

Check out this video, especially the end. I can't wait to see the final bio film.

How many burgers, beers and hot dogs is this poor guy going to have to scarf between now and election day? Love the rolling hills too.

NYC Marathon Take 2!

2008-08-24T10:49:00.003-04:00

Here is my training schedule for this year's marathon

Some things:

I'm vagabonding it this year. Even though I did enough qualifying races, I missed the registration deadline to take advantage of that (yes, I'm a dumbass). So I'll just show up and run the route. There's really nothing stopping you. I might even still get a medal at the end.

I put in more aggressive paramters from my training last year (I lied to the system, sayng I've been running 16-20 miles a week when I've been really sleeping a lot and not exercising).

Changes from last year:
I remember how how my legs gave out last year so, besides running harder I'm going to:

I am going to run 3 times a week instead of 2 like last year. The third workout will start as easy runs, but eventually include a lot of drills and hill repeats.

I'm really going to do strength training (legs, core and abs) weekly.

Concerns:
Last year, I gave myself 12 weeks to train, this year only 10. But, a month ago I was in very good shape (for the triathlon) so even though I've been chilling last month, I think I should still have a decent base. Oh well, we'll see what happens.

Rest in Peace Isaac Hayes

2008-08-10T19:31:00.000-04:00

Rest in Peace Bernie Mac

2008-08-10T10:18:00.001-04:00

Really Weird

2008-08-06T21:02:00.005-04:00

I can only stare at them, I'm too weirded out to eat them.

The Food Pyramid

2008-08-01T06:54:00.006-04:00

Even the snack cakes here are weird:

Adventures in RIPTA

2008-07-27T10:25:00.020-04:00

I still have not bought a car and am going as long as I can without one.

On my second tour of duty in Rhode Island I'm learning much more about RIPTA. I took RIPTA just once in three years at RISD. Between having friends with cars and being in the College Hill bubble, I didn't need the bus.

Last night, I went to a salsa social at The Spot, a yoga studio on Thayer street. Thayer street is my old college stomping grounds, the "hip" (I use this term loosely) strip of bars/restaurants and shops that cater to RISD and Brown students. It's over on the Eastside or Providence, next to the heart of Brown's campus, about two miles from me.

Quick background
I live in the "Armory district" (not a real neighborhood name, I think it's a real estate creation like "South Park Slope" instead of Sunset Park or "East Williamsburg" instead of Bushwick in Brooklyn).

It's the border of the West End (an economically depressed heavily immigrant neighborhood) and Federal Hill, Providence's touristy little Italy). It's a neighborhood in "transition." While it doesn't have the fancy history of the Eastside, there are beautiful homes here that people are buying and fixing up. It makes me think of the brownstones in places like Harlem and BedStuy.

I'll bike past Dexter Park down the street from me and I'll see on one side (mostly) white artsy hipsters playing in the Providence kickball league next to a weekly farmers market. Next to them, there's a regular pick-up soccer game played on a dirt patch of mostly Latinos next to my favorite taco truck.

Getting Over
Thayer street is two miles away and normally I'd bike it, but last night was pretty hot and I didn't want to sweat a storm so I took the bus.

Punch in Google Transit (note, ever since I found this service, I've cracked up every time Google tries to plan rational trips in RIPTA's system. I once wanted to get back from a dance class that ended at 9PM and it told me to take the 7AM bus the next day. Awesome).

Here goes:

50 minutes?? To go two miles??

Of course, there's a good reason. Kennedy Plaza, the center of the Providence (and Rhode Island) public transit universe, is about the midpoint of my apartment and Thayer street so I have to take a bus inbound to Kennedy, than another bus outbound to Thayer. I just walked the second leg rather than wait 30 minutes.

RIPTA doesn't just serve Providence, but the entire state. Kennedy Plaza is the hub where every (or nearly every) bus line meets. A system that has to take into account the entire state, might sacrifice some local convenience. Like being able take just one bus from one side of town to the other (I really tried to write that without a trace of sarcasm, honest).

All roads lead to Kennedy Plaza:

Of course, there's possibly something much more intentional at work here and that's the whole eastside/westside division which I've been getting a crash course on. I'm quickly getting the sense that Rhode Island is very provincial and that Providence (plus Central Falls plus Pawtucket and maybe some other nearby towns) is the colored chocolate chip of a very white cookie.

Providence itself is cut in half by 95:

To the west of 95, is the West End, Olneyville and Manton Ave. To the south of 95, South Providence and Elmwood. These are Providence's low-income and predominantly minority neighborhoods. To the east of 95 is downtown and the Eastside which includes College Hill.

Peter Hocking calls 95 a "psychological barrier" which is a perfect term for it.

On the surface, it seems ridiculous that I can't take a bus that runs down Broadway, one of Providence's main thoroughfares, directly to one of Providence's "hotter" shopping and nightlife destinations. But then that bus, before coming to my apartment, runs down Manton Ave, a neighborhood notorious for gang violence and its housing projects. I doubt there's huge incentive for the city and eastside residents and college administrators to make that route more direct.

I'm not surprised at the compartmentalization/segregation, I grew up in New York City, in the 80s and 90s. There are tons of people in the outer boroughs who consider Manhattan a whole another universe. I grew up in Park Slope and went to camp with kids from Bed Stuy and Flatbush. We lived, maybe a mile or two apart, but in completely different universes.

I think I'm adjusting to the microcosmic scale it happens here in Providence. I walk two blocks and I'm in a different neighborhood with a different reputation. The eastside is two miles away from me and it's the "other side of town". I can't take one bus to Thayer street. Providence has about as many people as Flushing and, but it's cut in more ways than I can count.

Can't we just be one proud city?

Or maybe I should just get a car and stop bitching.

Rest In Peace Randy

2008-07-25T20:14:00.004-04:00

Rest in peace Randy Pausch.

I'd deliberately avoided watching this lecture, I don't know why. Until now. Wow.

Love life. Never stop being geeked by what you get to do:

New Urban Arts on MTV News' Choose or Lose Campaign.

2008-07-25T15:13:00.000-04:00

New Urban Arts featured on MTV News' Choose or Lose Campaign!
RISD student Shoham Arad is spending the summer as a "citizen journalist" covering different issues in Rhode Island for MTV. Last week, she spent time in the New Urban Arts studio (where I work) and put together a story about our studio and the issues we address. Watch the video here:

NYC Triathlon

2008-07-22T22:04:00.004-04:00

First of all, rest in peace to Esteban Neira. My thoughts and prayers are with your family.

I finished the NYC Triathlon this last weekend. Amazing experience, it was a lot of fun and all my training paid off. Some random observations from my first-ever triathlon:

[A lot of] triathletes have really good looking girlfriends.
And really fancy bikes
And really fancy wetsuits.
Tight bike shorts+loose t-shirt+man=a terrible look
Crotch pads are a great invention

I was pretty happy with my time, everything shook out as I expected. I turned in a pretty strong swim (one of the faster times in my age group and not bad overall), but I run and bike about as fast as molasses. The chart below outlines it pretty well. My swim time compared to my bike+run times look like they come from two different people. A tale of two athletes. There's something really gratifying about my chubby self out swimming giant muscle-bound athletes. Who then proceeded to crush me once we got on our bikes. Check out my times (Yoon) compared to other people around me. My swim (23:58) is buttressed by people who swam their mile in the 30s and 40s. The columns (sorry no headers) are: Last name, place in age-group (30-34), Total time, swim time, Transition 1 (swim to bike), Bike, Transition 2 (bike to run), run time.

Here are some pics.

I hate Amtrak
You might notice I'm riding a hybrid bike in the pics, not a regular road bike you'd use for a race like this.

I used Amtrak package express to ship my bike from Providence to NY Penn Station. Turns out, even thought their customer service agent told me I'd be able to pick up my bike on Saturday, the NY package office is closed on weekends. No bike for me.

The race was Sunday. I rented a heavy-ass hybrid cruiser bike at a local shop and used that for the race. The bike is a tank, great for tourists casually checking out the west side bike path or cruising Central Park. Embarassing in a race like this.

Anyway, good looking out City Bikes on the short notice rental, you saved my ass. Amtrak, you can kiss my ass. I shipped a bike to NY for nothing. I couldn't even ship it back to Providence. Turns out, NY Penn Station only receives, they don't ship, WTF??? another thing the agent didn't mention. So I had to lug the bike box to a cab to Port Authority and take it with me on the Peter Pan bus. Another close call, because the bus almost didn't have enough luggage room for it.

The Circus

2008-06-18T00:40:00.002-04:00

Barack Obama should run the Mets.

Happiness is Good Street Food

2008-06-16T20:14:00.008-04:00

The take-out food near me is not ideal. There's spots down on Cranston Street and Olneyville Square but they're too far for a quick pick up. But now! I found this taco truck right near me on Dexter Park on Parade and Willow. The food is pretty good, but more importantly it's run by this really nice, friendly family. There were two kids serving customers while their dad cooked in the back. The kids were real sweet and patiently explained what all the dishes were to me. They said they're usually out evenings around 5-9PM.

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Short Money

2008-06-16T18:58:00.004-04:00

Giuliani Plans to Aid Hopefuls, for His Share

From the New York Times:

Mr. Giuliani’s aides have told the National Republican Congressional Committee and Congressional candidates that if he makes an appearance, he wants the candidates to help him get rid of his presidential campaign debt...“In a year when our candidates are struggling to raise money, this is just another burden,” said a leading Republican Party strategist, who was briefed about the mayor’s request. “This is not about helping the party. This is about helping Rudy Giuliani.”

Wow! What balls!

The fact that Mr. Giuliani — who had an estimated net worth of at least $30 million in 2006, according to financial disclosure forms filed last year — has loaned his campaign money gives the fund-raising a particular urgency. Candidates generally have unlimited time to pay off campaign debt. But if any portion of a personal loan to a campaign is unpaid by the end of an election cycle, the maximum amount that can be repaid with money raised after that is $250,000, according to Bob Biersack, a spokesman for the Federal Election Commission.

Guess that window is closing fast huh? Favorite part (emphasis mine):

Political analysts say that Mr. Giuliani’s once prolific fund-raising abilities have been hampered by several factors. Perhaps most significant is the fact that Mr. Giuliani neither holds a position in government nor is a candidate for public office. Both qualities are attractive to donors who are looking for access to government.
Beyond that, the reputation of Mr. Giuliani was hurt by the sudden collapse of his presidential campaign, as well as by the allegations of corruption that hung over Bernard B. Kerik, a former police commissioner in the Giuliani administration.

So I can make a donation so that a multi-millionaire not currently working in public life, who ran a deeply-flawed presidential campaign that imploded on itself before it even got started, can pay himself back some money he lent his own campaign? Sign me up!

It sounds almost as compelling as fighting genocide, disease and (shameless plug) youth arts programs in inner-city communities.

Look, I'm no political strategist but my (unsolicited) advice to Rudy would be:

Just eat the debt! Pay it off with some consulting gigs and corporate speaking events. You're still America's Mayor, even if you won't be our president, you can make that money back pretty easily. Leaning on some emerging Republican candidates just looks bad.

Focus on building goodwill in the Republican party, and more importantly, re-establishing your relevance and credibility as an important national figure. After the way your presidential campaign embarrassingly collapsed (remember when you were the front-runner and John McCain was dead in the water?). If I were you, I'd be fighting for the chance to help lower-rung Republicans get elected and proving that I've still got some sway with voters.

What Price an Executive Director?

2008-06-12T16:35:00.005-04:00

I found a price tag tied to my chair at my desk, I assume the product of some rascal New Urban Arts student (when I find you I'm going to....).

ASIAN
$10.00

Can work as a "director"
don't expect much to get done.

P.S. Requires a lot of hair gel.

I think I just found the text I need for a potential match.com profile. Its just missing "tall" and "handsome."

NYC Triathlon Training Schedule

2008-06-08T22:50:00.003-04:00

Last year, the night before I ran the NYC marathon, drunk in self-confidence and athletic hubris, I impulsively signed up for the NYC Triathlon thinking I had plenty of time to train for it (the marathon was November 2007 and the Triathlon is July 21, 2008). Well, the sucker is now less than two months away which got me thinking that I should probably start a training schedule a little more systematic than biking, swimming or running when I "feel like it." I found this training schedule courtesy beginner triathlete. It's designed for someone who's goal is to simply finish without dying which is what I'm about shooting for. It's a four-month schedule and I'm jumping in midway because I don't have four months. So here it is, I'll post workouts I complete at some attempt at accountability.

There Goes the Neighborhood

2008-06-06T08:15:00.009-04:00

Explaining Willie Randolph's paranoia

When asked about the possibility of race's playing a role in camera shots that show him only in stoic form that makes him appear unemotional and uninvolved, Randolph responded, "It smells a little bit."

The media pounced on his words like they came out of Jeremiah Wright's mouth. The vilification of him, the gall of him. The last thing anyone wants to hear is race and racism injected into the state of affairs of a team with the highest payroll in the National League playing under-.500 baseball months after a season-ending collapse unseen in this generation.

So even the thought that the color of one's skin could play a role – or have any legitimate bearing – on how the performance and passion of a manager is perceived by the public and thus possibly have some weight on the manager's job security is incongruous.

But not inappropriate.
-Scoop Jackson

Interesting article by Scoop Jackson . It's easy to forget how many years I would read about Willie futilely interviewing for manager positions knowing he was the token minority candidate before he got his chance when Minaya hired him. It was like an annual offseason baseball tradition for us in NY.

And you can make the argument that Minaya may have never have gotten his shot (or at least waited much longer) at the Mets GM position if it wasn't for his stint on the then MLB-owned Expos>Nationals where Bud Selig (for all his creepy faults, he sure does seem to love colored folk not named Barry Bonds) made a very public effort to place people of color in leadership roles, manager (Frank Robinson) and general manager. But even the first GM offer that the Mets made Minaya was some ridiculous power-sharing role with Jim Duquette where Duquette would handle administrative functions and Minaya would handle baseball/talent duties, a power split I don't think any MLB team has or had. It was as if they thought having successfully run the show at an underfunded mess of a franchise that the Expos were hadn't prepared him to be a full GM (I think the Expos former owner gutted everything in the offices before he sold the team, taking computers, staff, scouting data with him to the Florida Marlins). Minaya got handed a real wreck. To his credit (and pretty ballsy of him) he turned down the Mets' first watered-down job offer and fought for full autonomy, he even said as a Latino GM, he didn't want to accept anything less than full authority because of the message it might send.

It was only three-some years ago, but it was pretty wild to think that a MLB team, especially one of the richest ones, was handing the reigns of their franchise to a black dude and a Dominican dude. And as much as last season sucked, lets go back a little further to the Steve Phillips/Art Howe era *shudder* and be grateful for what they've done.

Anyway, the point is that while it may be absurd to imply that SNY is being racist in its shot selection of Willie, it's not ludicrous to think both Minaya and Randolph are subject to some extra (un)conscious bias, especially after all the shit they've been through to get where they are now.

Good Ole' Fox News

2008-04-18T08:14:00.001-04:00

Just How Much Cream is in That Twinkie?

2008-03-30T15:57:00.009-04:00

A topic of conversation (and humor) among some students and staff at New Urban Arts (where I work) has been the "Stuff White People Like" blog. There are a number of interesting topics that the blog could be a jumping off point for me to babble about (white privilege, gentrification, identity politics, class etc. etc.), but I'll spare you all any extended thoughts.

As funny as the blog is, my biggest beef is that it refers to a pretty privileged class and doesn't really get into how complex whiteness is in this country and how it's constructed. Of course, I don't think that's the responsibility/intent of this particular blogger. It's pretty entertaining and has us talking about race and identity in our studio community, which is pretty cool in and of itself.

So for shits and giggles, I decided to rate my own "whiteness" using a 1-5 scale for each item. I'm assuming that each item is weighted equally and I did my best to interpret questions that didn't directly refer to me as a non-white person (I'm Korean) e.g. being the only white person in a room. Check it out here. I'll keep updating it as I learn more about myself and as more items get added.

Rest in Peace Israel "Cachao" Lopez

2008-03-22T23:33:00.002-04:00

2008-03-19T07:34:00.007-04:00

Long run in Flushing

2008-03-16T15:06:00.002-04:00

Did this long run in Flushing today. I didn't come back up Booth Memorial Ave though, I just ran back through the Botanical Gardens coming back. Mileage should have been basically the same, I just got to bail on a hill! Very scenic. Some hills but nothing crazy:

Flushing: Kissena Park>Botanical Garden>Flushing Meadow Park
Find more Runs in Flushing, New York

New York, New York...

2008-03-11T00:17:00.002-04:00

Ok, it wouldn't be fair for me to not rag some on my beloved NYC after (another) weekend back home:

1. Umbrellas. New Yorkers hold them just over the tops of their heads as low as possible and then don't look where they're going. I think I got my eyes taken out almost a dozen times on Main Street in Flushing. Well ok, maybe this is just an Asian thing...

2. It seems like in places other then New York City, you can actually lock and leave your bike for more than a few hours at a time and reasonably expect it to still be there when you return. I've gotten my fair share of jokes from New Urban Arts staff and students for a) checking on my locked bike from my work desk every couple of hours b) either releasing the front wheel and locking it to the rear wheel or c) simply taking the front wheel to my desk and sitting with it. Whatever, I'm still that fat Chinese (Korean) kid in Prospect Park. I tried to tell them that bike thieves were so good in NY that Kryptonite's "gurantee" was always valid everywhere except in Manhattan USA:

In the late 1980s, just as Kryptonite began to offer a newly designed mountain bike lock, anti-theft guarantee claims began to increase dramatically in Manhattan. This increase in theft forced Kryptonite to stop offering the guarantee in Manhattan and spurred the Zane’s to redesign their locks.

-Lemelson Center for the Study of Invenion and Innovation

I forgot that it was so bad that it was a huge promotion when they came out with a guranteed Manhattan u-lock in 1994.

Kryptonite introduced the New York Lock in 1994. This newly designed lock allowed Kryptonite to reestablish an anti-theft guarantee for $1,000 in Manhattan. The company recreated its earlier publicity event by successfully locking bicycles throughout New York City to prove the efficacy of its locks.

Problem was, it was way smaller than their standard lock so you couldn't do the double wheel lock with it making it not so useful.

3. I may bitch about RIPTA but you know what? RIPTA a) takes dollar bills and b) gives you change (even in if it's only in the form of a credit on a RIPTA card). Will NY buses ever catch up?

Life in the Ocean State (No Peter Griffin Sightings)

2008-03-01T10:38:00.003-05:00

So far, I've been adjusting to life in Rhode Island a lot better than I thought I would, but there are still some things (cultural adjustments) I don't get. In no order:

Why do drivers, when they have the right of way, wave me in front of them? It's nice, but I'm a New Yorker, as a pedestrian, I don't trust drivers. Just go, take the damn light! This practice gets even stranger on 2-way streets, a driver on one side will wave me to cross ignoring the oncoming traffic coming the other way. Thanks, but no thanks. Even worse, is the miscommunication that happens at night when you can't see if the driver is waving you to cross and can't tell if you're going to take the free pass. It's an accident waiting to happen.

Bus stop signs. Would it kill you to write the actual bus line number that stops on the sign? It makes learning the bus system a lot more difficult.

No one shovels their walks here. I've almost busted my ass so many times here walking around. I don't get it, I guess it's not enforced, in NY we always hopped to it to avoid a ticket. I walk on the streets here and it's all ice. How are there not more lawsuits over this?

So far, not a big fan of the pizza dough up here (too thick, too mushy). I hear Sicilia's on Atwells is ok, but when I see a sign that says "NY Style pizza", I keep right on walking. Sorry Aneudy, even Saki's is probably not going to cut it.

I still don't like the license plates. The serif font is too big and that wave looks really cheesy.

First Run in Rhody

2008-02-03T12:40:00.000-05:00

Just did my first long run in Providence, about 8.5 miles. I found a great route on Mapmyrun.com. I needed a long run that took me all over and this was a nice route. Passed through the West End, Armory, Olneyville, Federal Hill, Smith Hilll (past the state Capitol), College Hill (Brown, RISD flashback!), downtown and back to my apt. Great way to get reacquainted with a good chunk of the city (except for all the damn hills!).

City View Loop
Find more Runs in Providence, Rhode Island

Google Check Out Test (DreamYard)

2008-01-18T13:52:00.001-05:00

The Big Move

2008-01-14T21:58:00.000-05:00

The New Crib (Cross Your Fingers!)
I spent last weekend looking for an apartment in Providence and I think I found one. Don't want to jinx it, but the Realtor said my application checked out and she would mail me the lease soon.

Here's the kitchen: Common area: Bedroom: The location is great, it's on Broadway, just under a mile from New Urban Arts. It's also near some great casual restaurants, within a few blocks of the place are Seven Star Bakery, Julians and Nicks, all of which are local hits. I'm also a healthy mile walk from Federal Hill if I need my meatball fix. Actually, I will want to get a "wimpy skippy" at Casertas. It's been awhile.

I'm not looking forward to getting a car which I'm probably going to have to do. I also forgot that Providence doesn't allow on-street overnight parking which leads to atrocious shit like this:

Almost no one has backyards in Providence because everyone has to pave them over to make them into parking lots like this sad example I saw in the South Side. You can see the grass fighting through the pavement even in this picture. Sad. Really sad.

J-O-B
Why does a city that strives to be much more cosmopolitan stubbornly have a law that makes it look so second-rate (especially late at night when you see all those empty streets)? My guess is tax revenue. Combine ongoing job loss, high unemployment and a city where you're losing a lot of property taxes because of higher education (Brown, RISD, Johnson and Wales, Providence College are probably some of the biggest property owners in the city) and they probably need every buck they can get. I'm seeing how much the foreclosure crisis is affecting property tax revenue in cash-rich New York City, I can't imagine how having so many non-profit property owners affects the taxes of a city like Providence that doesn't have as near as much industry as NYC (RI Hospital and Brown are the city's two biggest employers according to good old Wikepedia).

Driving around the different neighborhoods really hit home for me how economically depressed the city is. While it's been getting a lot of national press for being a "renaissance city" just looking around you can see the employment problem in the city (well, if you look in neighborhoods other than fancy downtown). Boarded-up houses and shuttered stores and people just hanging out during business hours. There are some serious challenges economically that the state and the city are going to have to deal with. RI has been losing manufacturing jobs at a really fast rate and apparently population too (net losses of population even after immigration is pretty scary when you think about it):

They said they watched as lifelong friends moved away in search of better conditions; census officials estimate that Michigan lost 30,500 people in the year starting July 2006, one of only two states (along with Rhode Island) to lose population in that time.

New York Times 1/13/08

It ends up being a self-perpetuating problem. The lack of jobs leads to an ongoing brain drain of the entrepreneurial talent most likely to start new innovative businesses locally. I asked one of the realtors about all the new development I was seeing downtown; a few luxury high-rise condominiums. His firm had actually sold about half of the new condos in one of the new buildings. I asked him if there was some kind of common profile of the condo buyers thinking that Providence might be attracting some other youngish professionals like myself and this might be a good for sign for its struggling economy. He told me that most of the buyers were Brown University parents who wanted a place for their kids to live off campus and/or a place for them to stay when they visit their children. Not exactly the kind of thing your city wants to stake its whole economic future on.

Art Saves! Or Something Like That...
What does this all mean for me as an outsider, a creative person, a community-oriented individual, an educator and now, the pending Executive Director of a small funky-after school arts studio that bring together artists and teenagers in this very city?

I'm not sure, but I'm excited to see what our community comes up with and facilitating that conversation. I'm not naive enough to believe to think that the arts alone, is some magic panacea that will solve deeply entrenched urban problems with global roots (in a class I took on arts and urban revitalization at Wagner, Professor Ruth Ann Stewart talked about arts cultural districts being most effective they were part of a holistic plan aiming various urban problems e.g. education, workforce development, public transportation, tax incentives etc.). But at the same time, my mantra is that the artist and art must be part of their community(ies). Shit, that's what my graduation speech was about. Job creation is hard. Better men and women have wrestled with this question than me. In the early nineties I remember reading one of George Bush's (the first) aide's anonymously ask a reporter "how DO you create a job?" It's not exactly a science, but I think you focus on creating conditions that make innovation most likely to occur and that's where unlocking creativity comes in. Any good career counselor will tell you not to choose an educational path based on what industries are hot because industries change fast.

I think that's where we come in, giving kids and artists the space and belief in themselves, to experiment, to fail and succeed, creates the kind of people with a far less limited sense of what's possible. If you ask me, that's what's really going to fuel development. Shirley Brice Heath (one of my heroes) writes some really great stuff about how community arts spaces instill entrepreneurial instincts in kids' language and sense of what they can achieve.

That's the beauty of this work, we can't predict what's going to happen, where or how the next big innovation will come from, but we can create conditions that make it more likely to happen.

Trade Imbalance

2008-01-01T23:30:00.001-05:00

Saw this one ESPN:

Tis' the Season

2007-12-31T18:27:00.000-05:00

My Mom, Dad and I checked out one house in Bayside (Queens) with infamous lighting. I'm at a loss for words:

Don't Stick a Fork In Me Yet

2007-12-23T07:52:00.002-05:00

I noticed this ad has recently started showing up on my Facebook profile. I know my birthday is this June, but couldn't they wait?

Whatever, thirty is the new twenty.

Pudding Pies

2007-12-22T22:12:00.000-05:00

I used to dream about these and I was devastated when they were discontinued.

The Food Pyramid

2007-12-22T13:33:00.000-05:00

Dennis found this and this shit took me back! Not that I grew up in the 'hood (just Park Slope pre-hyper hipsterfication), but anyone who grew up in NYC should remember trying to stretch that dollar as far as it could go at the cake stand at their local local bodgea, Korean grocery, Optimo, Te-Amo what have you...

"These won't go bad until 2000 forever."

My winning combo:

$.50 Crunchy mini-donut pack/Iced honey bun (with the white frosting, not that clear shit/frosted apple pie cakes
$.25 4-cookie Drakes packs (strangely not covered in this video). I think they're up to $.35 a pack now which sucks, but for a quarter, they were a ton of calories for the penny. Best flavors: lemon, coconut or oatmeal
$.25 Gotta go savory now, bag of chips. Dipsy doodles(BBQ!)/Crispy cheese doodles(never puffy)/sour cream and onion.

Other winners:

$.25 Nutty bars (wafers=carbs, peanut butter=protein, TWO came in one pack)
$.50 Those GIANT 2-for- a-dollar cookie packs!!! Yo, I used to make myself sick eating those things. The fudge striped cookies were the best, and you knew they were bootlegs of the Keebler ones you always saw on TV, but it didn't matter.

My poor mother, she packed me tuna and alfalfa sandwiches and wondered why she had a fat kid...LOL

Coup Proofing

2007-12-09T06:16:00.000-05:00

We've already seen Britney go off the deep end in 2007. You know who might be joining her for the holidays? Every single Knicks fan!
You can't overstate the level of passion and frustration here. I have rational, thoughtful friends sending me e-mails like, "I turned down courtsides tonight because I would have ended up walking over to Dolan's seat and punching him in the face."

Bill Simmons wrote a (typically) funny column lambasting us Knicks fans, telling us to stop feeling sorry for ourselves and making the (accurate) point that one of the only reasons that the ongoing black comedy/tragedy that is the Knicks gets as much national attention as it does is because we're such a big damn media market. I say give them some credit, a multi-million dollar lost sexual harassment suit? Star players having sex with interns in their trucks? An owner that cares more about the outfits of the Knicks City Dancers than the Knicks' actual won/lost record? I'm not even getting into the Rangers. I think this might get some national attention even coming out of Utah.

Seriously though, I get his point. It's not that bad and it's our memory of the recent good years that make this now so awful. But at least we had the good years.

Alright, now that I've perfunctorily acknowledged my self absorption as a native New Yorker and longtime Knicks fan, I'm going to proceed to bitch and moan and feel sorry for myself.

I am officially on Knicks strike. I am not a Knicks fan until Dolan sells the team. It's not enough to fire Isaiah. Even if he's fired, he'll just get replaced by some other sycophant that will continue to run that team into the ground. No self-respecting basketball professional is going to work in that madhouse. Only kiss-asses that know how to navigate the dysfunctional culture that Dolan has created will take this job. For my organizational behavior class at Wagner, one of our readings was about how Saddam Hussein had coup-proofed himself in Iraq by setting up reward structures that all flowed through him, ensuring that no group of factions would ever get together to overthrow him. Dolan, for all his basketball incompetence, is a pretty damn good despot. Even fucking David Stern can't get him removed.

Looking at the team itself, one of the things that frustrates me the most is that it's actually really hard to hate this team which is why I'm choosing to hate Dolan. This isn't like the Jailblazers of the late 90s. Save Steph when he's acting petulant, most of them seem like likable people. They always publicly support the coach, each other and the organization. It was classy to stand as a team at Don Marbury's funeral as a public statement of unity, especially after Steph had so recently cut out on them. Talent-wise, each player is someone I can easily see most general managers wanting on their roster depending on their needs. Save Jerome James (why???), there really isn't any dead wood on the roster. Everyone has some valuable basketball assets (just not enough defensive assets). But it's like Zeke wants the whole to end up equaling less than the sum of its parts.

So I'm on Knicks strike. I'm not rooting for an NBA team (though I enjoy watching the Celtics) until Dolan is replaced.

NYC Marathon Pics

2007-11-10T09:53:00.000-05:00

Oh, the agony!

NYC Marathon Thoughts...

2007-11-05T21:52:00.000-05:00

When you see thousands of people cheering you on, handing out all sorts of goodies (thank goodness for those orange slices) and telling you that you will make it, you are reminded of how the bond of humanity connects us at a far deeper level and how it bring us all together in good and in bad times. I realized then how proud I was to be a New Yorker and so blessed to be living in one of the greatest cities in the world.

My friend Raj's girlfriend, Nadia, like me, ran her first marathon yesterday and said this about it. She took the words right out of my mouth. It was incredible. The last time I felt this kind of citywide sense of unity, of brotherhood and sisterhood was, sadly, just after September 11. But this was obviously different, a joyous celebration of life and achievement.

Coming off the Verrazano bridge running fourth ave and hearing and seeing all the people cheering for us almost brought tears to my eyes. The unconditional support for our utterly quixotic endeavor moved me. Virtually every neighborhood we went through had people out on the streets, rich, middle class, poor, all races and ethnic groups, lifelong New Yorkers to transplanted hipsters to recent foreign immigrants. From reggateon rappers in Spanish Harlem to the Bishop Loughlin Marching Band to merengue blasting in Sunset Park we ran through a pageant of New York City, even though we were the ones on parade.

I was so proud to be a New Yorker, reminded how much I love this city, but also sadly realized how much work has to be done to continue to fight to keep this city a place where the vitality I saw and experienced along the route can always exist, where people can afford to live, go to school, work and sustain themselves.

My Performance
I guess I'll start with the positives:

I finished (!)
I experienced severe cramping at various points from mile 19 and had to stop several times to walk and stretch it out. I seriously thought I would have to stop the race all together the cramping was so bad. But I worked out the cramps, got a second wind at mile 20 and ran most of the rest of it and ran a strong finish for the last 1.2 miles

OK, now to the heart of it:
I was shooting for a time of 4:30 (my best half is a 1:56, granted at Staten Island, which is flat compared to the NYC course, but I thought it was still a realistic target) and ended up clocking in at 5:00:39. I can't believe I didn't even break five hours, which I'm embarrassed by. I analyzed where and how my body broke down and despite a scientifically calculated training schedule tailored to my pace, it didn't include any hill training which is what killed me in the end. The Pulaski Bridge at mile 13 and the Queensboro bridge at miles 14 to 16 took everything out of my legs and led to my calves cramping at mile 19. I'm mad, but now I know what to differently for my training next year. I'm swear, I'm going to rock the sucker out next year...

The highlights
Mile 1-2: The Verrazano bridge. It was breathtaking to see the bridge tower over us on what was a beautiful clear sunny day with music blasting and the Queensboro bridge in the distance knowing that was where we were headed.

Mile 3: The rush of humanity into the cheering crowds on fourth avenue, I almost cried.

Mile 4-6: Sunset Park. The smell of Mexican food, I really wanted to stop and grab some food....sopes?

Miles 6-10: Just trying to hold back at a solid 10:30/mile pace. Holding down my adrenaline, breathing steadily. Favorite part here was the Bishop Loughlin Marching Band set up in front of the school playing the theme of "Rocky."

Miles 10-13 Uh-oh, finally starting to feel some achiness, I had been hoping I cold stave off serious pain until mile 18 or so...

Mile 13 to 14 The Pulaski Bridge, or what I like to now call the "widow maker". The ramp onto the bridge was steep and I wasn't ready for anything like that. Hill workouts in Harlem in Central park didn't cut it. I'm training on bridges next year I swear to fucking...

Miles 14 to 15: The best moment of the race for me. I saw my father on Vernon Blvd, he had a big grin on his face when he saw me and I stopped and shook his hand. He said my mom was on her way, but I couldn't wait so I kept going and he wished me luck while I ran off. I felt bad missing my mom, but then I saw her around the corner and ran up to her and she gave me a hug and kiss. Everyone running with me started clapping and she wished me luck when I got back in the pack.

Miles 15 to 16: The Queensboro bridge, or the "widow maker part II". Whatever structural integrity my calves had left after the Pulaski Bridge was killed here, especially on the sharp downhill ramp coming off the bridge (ow, ow, ow, ow, ow...)

Miles 16 to 19 Basically, I was in a daze while I struggled to keep my feet under me on first ave. This is supposed to be the most exciting part of the race, but all I remember was seeing a lot of fogginess and hearing a lot of noise on the sides. Oh, I think I was trying to run also. One of my friends from Wagner saw me around 90th and yelled my name. I don't even know how I heard her. Two of my best friends saw me at mile 19 and yelled my name just as I hit my wall.

Mile 19: Severe cramping, walk, run, stretch, repeat. At the top of the Willis Ave Bridge (fucking bridges) I stopped and did some thorough stretching and gentle flexing/extension of my calves which finally worked.

Mile 20: My legs finally recovered, I'm running gingerly, but I feel good, I've got a second wind. Any chance of making 4:30 is now out the window, but finishing under five hours is well within reach so I run confidently through the South Bronx. Not being so concerned with my time now, I relax, high five a bunch of kids and pump my arms and wave at the crowds. Basically, I start having some fun.

Mile 21: My boss yells my name and jumps out and runs with me a couple of blocks. I've been alone the entire 21 miles so far (I ran half the bridge with Raj, but that was about it) and it was a great boost to have someone out there with me, even for just two blocks.

Mile 22 to 24 Holy fucking shit, why did they put this incline at the end of the race?? 119th and 5th ave south to 90th and 5th Ave. Walking it, you'd never think of it as a hill, but at the end of a marathon it's a miserable, slow, painful climb...

Mile 24: My legs give out, I can't feel them I can't run, I'm walking and it hurts too much to walk. People are yelling 'you can do it!' and I want to lie down and die and/or yell back 'leave me alone, I can't do it!!!'.

Mile 25: I have to figure something out, I can't walk, I can't run. I pull over to the side and say 'fuck my time, I'll be damned if I'm walking across the finish line' and take a good 5-10 minutes and stretch my calves, quads, gluts and hamstrings. Once I've got my blood circulating again (and after I've refused medical attention three times) I hop back on the course and my legs feel great, I'm kicking myself for not having stopped sooner to stretch out again (walking hadn't felt any better than running anyway), but I take off for the last 1.2 miles.

Mile 26: Columbus Circle: I see my friends Gloria and Anil who shout my name out, I'd been running well the last mile, but seeing them and knowing I was at the finish gave me the final kick I needed and I took off passing a bunch of people at the tail end:

Pulling into Central Park: The other moment I almost cried. After all the pain and wondering if I was going to even finish, after having to humbly alter my target goals mid race, I realized I was going to finish the damn thing, and I was going to finish strong, and I was doing it at the intersection where I had been doing all of my long runs dutifully every Sunday preparing for this moment.

26.2 miles: The finish, I threw my arms up and crossed the finish line.

And the worst part? Having to walk another mile to get out of the damn park :)

Congratulations to every single person who trained and entered this race. I just read Siddhartha, and for all of us, it's about the journey.

Stupid Trivia
I own the rather dubious distinction of being the youngest AND the slowest 'Yoon' in the entire 2007 NYC Marathon:
But at least I was the fastest 'Jason' who ran slower than five hours (chew on that one):
Glenna, my friend, training guru and sometime training partner, and I ran bizarrely similar splits for good chunks of the race despite being not even seeing each other the entire race
And lastly, I was mostly pissed that I wasn't going to be listed in today's hard copy New York Times because they typically only list runners who finish under five hours. But I assume because they had to fill the last page they actually went all the way up to 5:04 so I still back doored my way into today's paper! WooHoo!

My New Training Log
I'm now on a mission to eat as much junk food as I can and undo all of my training. For lunch today, I had General Tso's chicken and pork fried rice from the ghetto Chinese spot near work on Gerard Ave and 161st. Dinner was fried chicken wings and french fries. Tomorrow I'm hitting the fried fish joint on 161st for lunch (see a pattern?).

Later this week, I'm hitting the chuchifritos spot across from Casa Latina (after I treat myself to a new CD) for some mofongo with gravy and pasteles. I'll also hit Mannas before they go out of business (I read in the Daily News their building is getting bought out). And yes, I will get the fried rice there.

It's a lot of work, but I think I can do it...

Marathon Training (last one!)

2007-11-03T14:35:00.000-04:00

Ryan Shay (r) at the 2002 USA Outdoor Track & Field Championship

I'll start this by offering my condolences to the friends and family of Ryan Shay who died this morning while running the Olympic Marathon Trials in Central Park. I woke up early to watch the Olympic Marathon trials in Central Park to get some inspiration for tomorrow's NYC Marathon. I'm always awed watching the mechanics and focus of the elite runners. I got to the race at about 9:30 and cheered for the runners before heading over to Javits Center to pick up my registration for tomorrow. I didn't find out until later that afternoon what had happened. I'm not sure how I feel about it, I'm not worried for myself running tomorrow, it's a freak incident that you can't dwell on, especially if you've been taking care of yourself. I think it's the fact that he died literally in the thick of pursuing his dream while probably at, or near, the peak of his ability as a runner. On one hand, for a competitive athlete, it may be the ultimate way to go out, but on the other hand I can't help but think of all the lost potential and what could have been for him.

Rest in peace Ryan, we'll all be thinking of you while we're running tomorrow.

Now, the final two work outs of the workout schedule I started way back in August. Looking back at my original schedule, I am really proud of having stuck to it. I've done every work out on the schedule plus countless dance classes and I know I am prepared for tomorrow.

November 1, 2007
Tempo run
1 mile warm up 86th St and Lexington Ave to 103rd and 5th Ave

3.2 miles (I ran it in 27:13)
From 103 and 5 to the finish of the NYC Marathon at Tavern on the Green

Half mile cool down
Total mileage
4.5 miles

Comments:
It was really exciting to run in the park and see the fencing out in the final mile, the bleachers and the finish line at Tavern on the Green. The finish is going to be tough, hopefully adrenaline will pull me through.

November 2, 2007
2-mile easy run

NYC Marathon

2007-10-31T21:25:00.000-04:00

My friend forwarded me a pretty cool spreadsheet that calculates (roughly) what time you'll cross each marker at the NYC marathon based on your bib number and your expected time of finish. My times are below. if you want to download the whole spreadsheet, you can get it here.

Marathon Training

2007-10-31T21:13:00.000-04:00

October 30, 2007
2 miles easy run
19:53

October 28, 2007
5 miles
58:52
11:46 per mile

Did the Poland Spring 5-mile kick off. Was supposed to do 8 miles total, but some late night partying did me in...

October 25, 2007
2-mile warm up to Astoria Park

Was supposed to do 3 miles at 8:59
Actual splits:
1 8:18
2 8:28
3 8:06

1-mile cool down

Total: 6 miles

Marathon Training

2007-10-21T13:50:00.002-04:00

Marathon Training October 18, 2007
Because I was heading out of town early Thursday morning, I did my tempo workout early Thursday instead of in the evening.

I was supposed to do seven miles, one mile warm up, five miles at 8:53/mile and one mile cool down. I ended up doing a one mile warm up and only four miles in
43:16, a pretty miserable pace. But I had gone to Djoniba's dance class the night before which killed my legs, so I think I deserve a mulligan for that workout.

Marathon Training October 21, 2007

My final endurance run!

I ran 18 miles in Central Park (3 loops all heading north from the 72nd St east side entrance) in 3:14:05 which comes to 10:47 (rounded) per mile. My work out calendar said my pace should have been 10:17 per mile but Central Park has a number of hills that the training calculator doesn't take into account. I felt great and from here on out, it's time to taper until November 4th!

Marathon Training

2007-10-14T17:08:00.000-04:00

Supposed to do a long run of 16 miles at a 10:14 pace. I got to the Staten Island Half Marathon early and ran three miles in roughly an 10:30-11:00/mile pace. Then I did the actual half marathon (13.1 miles) in 2:09:21 for a 9:52 pace.

Here is the actual result:

Comments:
I felt very very good during today's run. I didn't push myself too hard and gradually descended my splits (roughly 10:30-11 for the first 5, down closer to 10 for the next 5, then 9 for the final three 3 miles). Next week's long run peaks at 18 (yikes) then I begin to taper.

Chocolate Thunder!

2007-10-13T13:02:00.000-04:00

On my ongoing quest for inspiration I'm still reading The Impossible Will Take a Little While, a collection of essays, stories etc. by some serious heavy hitters in social justice movements (Marian Wright Edelman, Desmond Tutu, Nelson Mandela etc.), but its the very personal writing in this collection by the people I don't know as well that have affected me the most (e.g. Billy Wanye Sinclair refusing to bribe his way out of prison at a huge personal cost, Diane Ackerman wondering if her work at a suicide hotline makes any difference at all on the "pageant of humankind").

The story I have been reading most repeatedly has been Do Not Go Gentle by Sherman Alexie. He describes being in the hospital with his wife and his dying new-born baby. To clear his head he goes out shopping for baby toys but ends up in a sex-toy store. Suddenly, he is inspired to buy a vibrator and create a new ritual to save his baby. He rushes back to hospital inspired and a bit delusional. But what he describes is so moving, I felt his emotions, his hope, his despair but refusal to give up on the life of his son (the line breaks are mine, not his):

I ran into the fourth floor ICU, pulled Chocolate Thunder out of its box, held it up in the air like a magic wand, and switched it on.

It was sex that made our dying babies, and here was a huge old piece of buzzing sex I was trying to cast spells with. I waved it over our baby and ran around the room waving it over the other sick babies. I was laughing and hooting, and a few others didn't know what the hell to do. But pretty soon everybody was taking their turns casting spells with Chocolate Thunder. Maybe it was blasphemous, and maybe it was stupid and useless, but we all were sick and tired of waiting for our babies to die.

We wanted our babies to live, and we were ready to try anything to help them live.

Maybe some people can get by with quiet prayers, but I wanted to shout and scream and vibrate. So did plenty of other fathers and mothers in that sick room.

We humans are too simpleminded. We all like to think each person, place, or thing is only itself. A vibrator is a vibrator is a vibrator, right? Everything is stuffed with ideas and love and hope and magic and dreams. I brought Chocolate Thunder back to the hospital but it was my magical and faithful wife who truly believed it was going to bring our baby back to life.

Sherman Alexie from Do not Go Gentle from Ten Little Indians

A vibrator is a vibrator is a vibrator huh? I love it. Is it a pipe? I've been reading this story repeatedly, I'm not sure why. I'm not a parent, but Alexie makes me feel like what it must be to be one and I think it's that unconditional love and faith (irrational as both may be at times) that he expresses so beautifully that keeps calling me back.

Marathon Training

2007-10-13T11:25:00.000-04:00

Did a speed workout last night.

1 mile warm up to Astoria Park Track

Supposed to do 4 miles at an 8:14 pace followed by half mile jogs. Actual splits:

1mile 7:50
half mile jog
1mile 7:51
half mile jog
1 mile 7:40
half mile jog
1 mile 7:26
half mile jog

1 mile cool down jog

Total: 8 miles

Comments: I felt very good and was surprised how easy it was to do what was for me fast splits. Next up, Staten Island Half Marathon, a key tune-up run for the NYC Marathon.

Marathon Training

2007-10-08T10:29:00.000-04:00

10 miles in Central Park, time about 2 hours.

I experienced the first major setback of my training so far. My workout schedule called for 14 miles at 10:23 but my legs gave out at 10 miles and I had only been going at an 11:00+ pace. I hope this was just a temporary setback and hopefully it happened because I did a tempo run on Friday night instead of Thursday like I usually do.

And Then There Was The Word...

2007-10-06T15:39:00.000-04:00

I grew up a Christian (Protestant, First Baptist) and so naturally scripture was a big part of my reading growing up. As I’ve become more disengaged from the church in the last ten years or so I haven’t really been reading much of the Bible. But in a weird coincidence I’m currently reading three things that have taken me back to my church days but also have me thinking more critically about the Bible. How it has been assembled from myriad sources, how much translation is more art than science and how much historical context can affect interpretation of the texts, especially one written over hundreds of years.

In The Impossible Will Take A Little While, there’s an essay by Walter Wink, Jesus and Alinksy, in which he parallels Christ with the famous community organizer, Saul Alinsky. He argues that Christ’s instructions of passiveness, when examined in the context of the harsh Roman occupation of Judea at the time and common social norms, can be interpreted as instructing people to non-violently resist imperial authority through the assertion of dignity rather than meekly to submit to their earthly conditions in hope of a glorious after-life. Wink takes a closer look at three famous examples to make his case.

To Wink, the oft-referenced example of turning the other the cheek (especially cited when Christianity is being criticized for its role in colonizing people) does not mean that you are to be repeatedly pummeled in a fight between equals. It’s instead a dignified response to a very specific situation of a backhanded slap to your right cheek by someone who has complete power over you. In Jesus’ time, one could only hit the right cheek with the back of the right hand because the left hand was only to be used for unclean tasks. Wink argues that Jesus’ audience would have recognized the unequal power dynamic of the right cheek slap and understood his instruction of offering the other cheek to be an assertion of dignity (any other kind of protest in that situation would have been unthinkable) and a non-violent, but obvious message of protest.

Another example is Jesus’ instruction to carry a Roman soldier’s equipment for two miles if asked carry them one. Roman soldiers were actually not allowed to ask anyone to carry their things for more than one mile and this was well known. To try to exceed that limit would have been recognized as an attempt to diminish the dignity of the occupying soldier and assert your own. The third example Wink offers is the offering of your clothes in a debtor’s court to the point of nudity. Wink points out that nakedness was such a taboo that shame would have fallen not “on the naked party but the person viewing or causing the nakedness.” In a situation of complete powerlessness (destitution) Wink’s argument is that Jesus is teaching his audience how to assert power where there seems to be none available.

James Wood, in his review of Richard Alter’s new Translation of the Book of Psalms, looks closely at how Alter has tried to stay more faithful to the rhythm and brevity in the original Hebrew sources and how the King James Version [KJV] translation may have taken some liberties in translation to ensure a more docile people.

Wood compares Alter’s compact translation to the KJV:

He [Alter] is particularly alive to formal aspects of ancient Hebrew poetry and prose such as repetition, internal rhythm, and parallelism (in which a phrase amplifies and almost repeats a preceding phrase, as in “He shall come down like rain upon the mown grass: as showers that water the earth,” from Psalm 72). Because the Psalms are poems, he wants to preserve in English what he calls the “rhythmic compactness” of the originals, “something one could scarcely guess from the existing English versions.” His helpful introduction is more polemical than the exegeses he has provided for his other translations: he argues that even the King James translators, whom he, like everyone else, has always admired, pad out their versions with filler.

Later on, he looks at particular aspects of Hebrew syntax that Alter tries to remain faithful to such as the fact that in many Hebrew sentences the subject of a verb in a sentence is often left unstated and simply referred by the conjugation of the verb (I found this interesting because it’s actually similar to Korean sentences which almost always leave the subject unspoken, but assumed by conjugation and context).

Besides trying to staying faithful to Hebrew structure, Alter tries to clean the Psalms of their ‘Christianization’ and some of the liberties that the KJV translators must have made to align the mercurial, vengeful God of the Old Testament with the forgiving salvation-offering God of the New:

…he is determined to remind his readers that they are reading ancient texts with hybrid origins, not Christian prayers with dedicated destinations. The Psalms (like the Book of Job) were relentlessly Christianized by the King James translators.

Alter also makes the focus less on the after life and more on the current one:

Suddenly, in a world without Heaven, Hell, the soul, and eternal salvation or redemption, the theological stakes seem more local and temporal: “So teach us to number our days.” Psalm 23, again, is greatly refreshed by translation.

The K.J.V. has the last half line of the psalm as “and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever.” Alter slaps a term limit on the eternal, and suggests “And I shall dwell in the house of the LORD / for many long days.” Again, a footnote anchors the decision: “The viewpoint of the poem is in and of the here and now and is in no way eschatological. The speaker hopes for a happy fate all his born days.”

Lynne Truss, in the hysterical Eats, Shoots and Leaves, looks at how the choice of one comma placement can lead to “huge doctrinal differences.”

“Verily, I say unto thee, This day thou shallt be with me in Paradise”

“Verily, I say unto thee this day, Thou shallt be with me in Paradise”

The first being the Protestant interpretation that takes the crucified thief next to Jesus “straight to Heaven.” The second sentence is the Catholic interpretation, which leads to Purgatory. (“You’ll be with me in Heaven but I’m not saying when you’ll get there”).

These three articles/books are really helping to me look at something intimately familiar to me with fresh eyes. As much I’d like to think of myself as a critical reader, I was taught to accept the Bible as one unified book with one author (God working through the writings of various men) rather then a collection of writings and translations that are the products of incredibly diverse people and social and historical contexts.

Marathon Training

2007-10-06T06:50:00.000-04:00

Tempo Run

1 mile warm up, jog to Astoria Park Track

5 miles at 8:59 pace
Actual total time
42:11 for an 8:26:2 pace per mile

1 mile cool down (jog/walk home)

Total miles: 7

Comments
I did this work out after a big dinner at Saravanaas so it was pretty unpleasant (the workout, the food was great, the service not so much). I felt nauseous during miles three to four.

Make It Stop...

2007-09-30T19:31:00.000-04:00

Someone at ESPN must have gone to art school, look at this use of contrast!

sigh...

How Many Days Until Pitchers and Catchers?

2007-09-30T18:58:00.000-04:00

No words, just no words....

Marathon Training

2007-09-30T18:48:00.000-04:00

Ran 15 miles at the NYC Marathon Tune-Up Run today in 2:21:08 which comes out to 9:25 per mile. The race was 18, but I'm only up to 15 so I just walked the last three.

Comments:
I'm in pretty scary territory now that my long runs are getting into the upper teens. I felt great in the first six, but I started to feel serious pain in towards the end of the second six and was able to muscle out the final 3 miles to get to 15. I don't know if I could have made it to 18 and I sure as hell don't know where I'm going to pull the final 11.2 miles from.

Jimmy Rollins for MVP! (maybe)

2007-09-29T19:27:00.000-04:00

Watching the Phillies play DC today has got me thinking about Jimmy Rollin’s yearlong saga from goat to hero…

When I first read Donovan McNabb’s comments on HBO about being a black quarterback, I thought “no big deal”, white journalists probably ask him stuff /say stuff about him all the time that they wouldn't say about white quarterbacks and don’t even realize they’re doing it. Does it mean McNabb’s saying that that white journalists are going home burning crosses and putting on white hoods and are out to stamp out the black quarterback? No, but its not outlandish to say we live in a racist society and that we all (even the mental giants that we call sports journalists) probably act differently towards people based on their appearances more than we want to admit.

That’s why I loved reading about the study that analyzed 13 years of referee foul calls in the NBA, because the study took a population that’s rigorously monitored to ensure neutrality (refs) and controlling for a ton of factors, STILL found evidence of racial bias. I shudder to think what you would find if you analyzed my behavior towards people of different races that rigorously over 13 years.

Unfortunately, the issue in the media became about labeling which referees were “racist” and “not racist” (as if they were either/or categories like pure good and pure evil) rather than an opportunity to learn about what unconsciously guides our behavior towards others.

…several prominent academic economists said it [the study] would contribute to the growing literature regarding subconscious racism in the workplace and elsewhere, such as in searches by the police.

“I would be more surprised if it didn’t exist,” Mr. Ayres said of an implicit association bias in the N.B.A. “There’s a growing consensus that a large proportion of racialized decisions is not driven by any conscious race discrimination, but that it is often just driven by unconscious, or subconscious, attitudes. When you force people to make snap decisions, they often can’t keep themselves from subconsciously treating blacks different than whites, men different from women.”

So McNabb, who was just answering a question honestly, is now the center of controversy because some idiot white sports journalists can’t possibly believe they could ever in the slightest bit be biased in their coverage of athletes of color.

Which brings me to my Jimmy Rollins for MVP campaign (only IF they win the division, which I am rooting firmly against).

As a Mets fan, let me say up front that I detest the Phillies, and by association, Jimmy Rollins.

But in spring training, I watched in fascination as the overwhelmingly white sports media piled on him for saying the Phillies, and not the Mets, were “the team to beat” in the NL East.

Apparently, Rollins was not showing enough deference to the defending NL east champs and running his mouth and not letting his actions on the field speak for him. I love my Mets, but I didn’t give a shit that Rollins said what he did. He was trying to get his team inspired and believing in themselves (a franchise that’s been mired in negativity for way too many years), but instead of praising him for his “leadership”, he became just another trash talking overly brash black athlete.

Watching the double standard towards black athletes unfold with Rollins was amazing. I couldn’t believe he was getting crap for such an innocuous remark, there was no way a white athlete would have been treated the same way for trying to get his team amped. It turns out now that Jimmy Rollins has had an MVP year full of clutch hits and great defense and his team might actually (*gulp) pull off an incredible upset.

If the Phillies win the East, I gotta say, Rollins for NL MVP.

But, Lets Go Mets!

Ya Gotta Believe!!!

2007-09-29T19:05:00.000-04:00

WE'RE TIED!

Magic number: TWO

Fall for Dance

2007-09-29T18:21:00.000-04:00

Thursday night, I went to the first of the three nights of the Fall for Dance Festival I had gotten tickets for. It was the first "real" dance performance I had ever been to (maybe formal is a better word) not counting the countless performances I’ve been in the NY On2 Salsa scene.

I've been looking for some inspiration in dance. After having been locked into salsa for so long I was really excited about these shows. I've been talking to one of my salsa teachers about what I think is the overall lack of creativity and artistry in the on2 salsa scene. There are some amazing technical dancers, but not enough musicality, creativity and artistic vision. It seems like everything is about doing the most complicated routine with no regard for music, risk-taking and expanding how salsa as a dance is defined.

I find salsa dance and music fascinating because you can't separate it from issues of diaspora and postcolonialism and have found that dancers from all backgrounds (ballet, jazz, hip hop, African, ballroom etc.) have easily found a pathway into salsa because it has roots in so many dance styles and cultures. And vice versa, (in my case) it’s a great dance to work backwards from because you’ve already learned the very basic vocabulary of other dance forms through salsa.

Long story short, I'm looking for some inspiration and Fall for Dance was a great start. Here's what I saw and what I thought (please note that I'm no dance critic).

Paul Taylor Dance Company
"Arden Court" Choreographer: Paul Taylor
This was by far my favorite of the night. I found out later that this is one his most famous works. I had seats that were really high up, but it was perfect for a piece like this. The choreography uses the whole stage and the overall forms he creates are so beautiful, I thought he had a visual arts background. The movement of the dancers feels like pure expression of the music (I want to listen to more William Boyce now). The dancers move in perfect harmony with each other; at different tempos (men from women), darting, crawling and leaping across the stage. This piece also requires an incredible amount of strength, especially on the part of the men. I was reading that this is considered by many dancers a very "masculine piece", which is still a hard adjective for me to use when describing shirtless men prancing around in pastel-colored pointilist tights, but you know what, the strength required by this piece is straight-up Herculean. There is one part where the men stand on one leg, their other leg fully extended, their backs flat (or slightly arched upwards) and the women leap and land on the small of the men’s backs, and tuck into a ball and just sit there. And the men don't move, they don't flinch.

I looked carefully to see if I could catch any shifting or adjusting (I'm a dick like that), but nothing. Holy fucking shit. There’s no way the woman will hit the man’s sweet spot every time they do that move so move so they just have to compensate a slightly different set of muscles (hamstrings, abs, back, calves and God knows what else) to maintain that effect each time.

Wow.

Kirov Ballet of the Mariinsky Theatre of St. Petersburg
"Middle Duet" Choreographer: Alexei Ratmansky
This was technically incredible, especially the female dancer. The choreography demands a lot of the woman dancer who has to make near instantaneous switches in her foot position to full plie and back again. On one hand, I should have liked it because it was a ballet dance with shades of Latin partner work (sharp breakbacks, crosshands, turn patterns, multiple spins by the woman led by the man), but I didn't find it visually that compelling. The woman's technique and body control was really incredible though.

Shantala Shivalingappa
"Varnam" Choreographer: Shantala Shivalingappa
This was Kuchipudi "a classical dance style from South India". It was a solo dance accompanied by a live band of Indian musicians. My seat was too high and far to the side to see the musicians which sucked. I couldn't get into this piece, the woman was a very sharp, clean dancer and dancing solo is incredibly difficult, but after awhile the movements started to feel montonous. When she got to the part where she was vibrating her body while standing on a brass plate ("the varnam") it got interesting again, but that ended up being near the conclusion of the piece.

Juilliard Dance
"Deuce Coupe" Choreographer: Twyla Tharp
Tacky. That was the first thing that came into my mind, and the piece just kept reinforcing it. First off, the backdrop was some big busy faux graffitti backdrop with "peace" in huge letters that didn't seem to relate to the music (a beach boys song), the dancer's costumes (weird 50s-style all-American collared shirts and pants) nor the dance movements itself (an awkward mix of classical ballet and herky-jerky 50s teen party sock hopish movements). The dancers looked stiff when they were asked to do anything other than ballet (the men's shoulders were hunched and slouched when doing non-ballet moves which bothered me). I might have been missing what her vision was, but it just seemed like a lot mismatched pieces that didn't sing well together.

Philly-DC

2007-09-29T18:01:00.000-04:00

4-0!!!

They hear the footsteps...

Philly-DC

2007-09-29T17:05:00.000-04:00

3-0 Nats!

That's what happens when Subway Jared shouts out Ryan Howard's defense.

Philly-DC

2007-09-29T17:01:00.000-04:00

5:02PM And another Phillies pitching change!

Phillies-Nats-Mets-Marlins

2007-09-29T16:57:00.000-04:00

Adam Eaton is out of the game!! Go Washington! C'mon Manny, we helped kickstart your managerial career, hook us up!

In other notes, John Maine's start had better woke up the Mets, what a fucking clutch start.

Marathon Training

2007-09-28T09:44:00.000-04:00

Tempo run

2 miles to Astoria Park Track

4 miles at 8:54 pace
My actual splits:
8:34
8:42
8:37
8:14

1 mile cool down (shuffle/jog/walk) back home

Total: 7 miles
Comments:
My legs and back were aching more than any tempo run (back from dance classes and legs from the Queens half on Sunday), I think I might be reaching the part of my training where my body aches more and I’m going to have to suck it up. Given that, I was glad my splits were all on target, its probably going to take more mental strength to maintain that (I really wanted to stop after the first mile).

Time to get ready for Jillian’s wedding.

Marathon Training

2007-09-23T12:17:00.000-04:00

Did the Queens Half marathon today. 13.1 miles in about 2:10 (I didn't look at the clock when I crossed the finish line).

Marathon Training

2007-09-21T05:10:00.000-04:00

Ran 7 miles Thursday morning, easy run. This Sunday, Queens Half.

Marathon Training

2007-09-18T22:58:00.000-04:00

Tagged along with the Team in Training workout in Central Park, just did some hill work, nothing crazy, but it was a good workout.

Dead White Men

2007-09-15T20:50:00.000-04:00

"undergraduates often arrive unprepared from high school and seeking courses “in what we might have thought of as the old-fashioned approach” — broad surveys. But many young professors aren’t interested in teaching outside their narrow specialties, nor are they generally prepared to do so. And colleges are loath to reinstate the core curriculums they abandoned in the ’60s. “Because we lack cultural self-confidence, we’ve lacked the ability to say, ‘This is a good book and should be taught, this isn’t and shouldn’t,’ ” said Judt, who was dean of the humanities at N.Y.U. in the early ’90s."

Very, very interesting article in the Times Book section. I've been thinking about this a lot, especially in the context of arts education and what it really means to “expose kids to the arts.” That phrase, thrown around a lot, is so loaded. It can be paternalistic, almost colonial (i.e. how do we “civilize” poor minority kids by exposing them to "great high artworks” and) or it can be empowering, helping kids find what’s beautiful and profound everywhere, even in their own experiences (which is my thing with 7ARTS).

But you don’t want the pendulum to swing to far in either extreme, how do you strike the balance between pushing someone outside of their comfort zones by providing "historical context" and reaching deep into the traditional "canon", but also exposing kids to works by people that are culturally relevant to them? As much as I believe in the opening of what we consider "the canon" (though I think the concept of one common canon a is long dead concept") I have begun to feel huge gaps in my own knowledge of Western culture, especially because I went to an art school focusing on studio art, my liberal arts education was much less broad than it could have been. I completely identified with this:

"As Alan Wolfe puts it, “Everyone’s read ‘Things Fall Apart’ ” — Chinua Achebe’s novel about postcolonial Nigeria — “but few people have read the Yeats poem that the title comes from.”

I never thought I’d reach an age where I actually began to see some merit in where E.D. Hirsch was coming from with his concept of “Cultural Literacy.” Maybe I’m just getting older and more Republican.

Bring on the dead white men, stat!

Marathon Training

2007-09-15T13:51:00.000-04:00

Did 11 miles this morning at the NYRR long training run. I ran with the 10 minute/mile group. My legs were on fire at the end, I went to Djoniba's class on Wed and Fri and had my speed workout Thursday.

Go New York Go (away)

2007-09-14T05:07:00.000-04:00

I’m done with the Knicks until Dolan and and Zeke go.

They were the first team I ever really closely followed beginning in the early 90s and to watch the franchise devolve from a hard-working team that scrapped and clawed for everything they earned in the league into a bunch of overpaid underachieving players has been extremely painful.

This whole Anucha Brown Sanders case is the final nail in the coffin though, it reveals how fucking completely amok the franchise is and that responsibility goes straight to the top at Dolan. This guy couldn’t lead people out of a fucking paper bag, let alone a franchise.

Stephon Marbury, the Knicks’ star guard, testified in federal court yesterday that he had sex with an intern for the team after a group outing to a strip club in 2005. The intern worked for Anucha Browne Sanders, who is suing Isiah Thomas, the team’s coach and president, for sexual harassment.

Asked to recall what he told Kathleen Decker, the intern, Marbury testified, “I said, ‘Are you going to get in the truck?’ ” She agreed, he said.

Earlier, Browne Sanders, a former senior vice president for marketing for the Knicks, testified that Decker was one of several employees who told her about abusive behavior by Hassan Gonsalves, a cousin of Marbury who worked for Browne Sanders in a low-level job. Gonsalves got the job through Marbury’s request to James L. Dolan, the chairman of Madison Square Garden.

Gonsalves was later fired for sexual harassment.

NY Times

I expect pro athletes participate in their share of sexual shenanigans, but this is about managing your workplace and it reveals how Dolan simply doesn’t have control of it. It seems he’d rather be liked then set limits, from giving Zeke free spending reign without demanding any accountability (and extending his contract early despite his own stated requirements), to letting Steph’s cousin be hired for some bull shit job (Starbury’s already on already on contract, you don’t have to hire a knucklehead from his entourage if you don’t want to).

What’s also been clear from the coverage of this case is that Sanders repeatedly had difficulty getting Thomas and the Knicks to participate in marketing for the team.

I remember thinking that the TV promos on MSG for the Knicks featuring local New Yorkers interacting comically with life-size cut outs of different Knicks were clever and endearing, but I wondered why none of the actual players were actually participating live. Apparently, because they had frozen Sanders out refusing to work with her, a movement led by Zeke. How the fuck do you allow this Dolan? You may not care about creating a hostile-free workplace for your female employees, but this affects your bottom line. I’m going to guess that all standard NBA contracts have clauses requiring participation in marketing and PR for the league and franchise. If I’m the team owner and my marketing director tells the players to be part of a campaign they better hop the fuck to it and play nice. At the end of the day, we’re all trying to get paid.

But, it seems like Dolan wants to be one of the boys so bad, that he didn’t intervene in that and other situations and which is why this whole shit has spiraled into the mess it is.

Duck Folan

Marathon Training

2007-09-14T04:07:00.000-04:00

Speed workout

2 miles warm up to Astoria Park track

1 mile at 8:06
800 meters jog
1 mile at 7:57
800 meter jog
1 mile at 7:25

1 mile cool down

total workout: 7 miles

Escalating Commitments

2007-09-09T18:28:00.000-04:00

After my 9-mile run, I headed to NYC Center to try to get the jump on their Fall for Dance Festival. Tickets are 10 bucks and each night is four very different types of dance troupes. After being not too inspired by the shows I saw at the most recent NYC Salsa Congress (and downright horrified when I saw Al "Liquid" Silver put on blackface for his James Brown impersonation-you know that feeling of horror and fear you get when you're experiencing someone doing something incredibly racist that's not aimed at your ethnic group? That's what I felt, I was kind of waiting for him to get jumped by all the black people in the audience, but everyone loved it, go figure. That routine merits its own whole other blog entry actually at some point) the City Center Shows seemed like a good chance to broaden my exposure to dance.

Tickets went on sale at 11, I got there right at 11 and the line stretched around the block.

I was willing to wait about 3 hours and I thought I would wait and get a sense of the pacing and see if it was worth it. The first two legs took about 2+ hours so I thought the final leg down 55th street to the box office wouldn't be much more than an hour. I don't know what the hell happened but I didn't make it to the ticket booth until 4:00. The final block was a backbreaking 3 hours. I can't figure out why it took so long, but at that point I had committed too much time to back out and I kept adding to the amount of time I had originally been willing too wait. Flashback to grad school and sunk costs and escalation of committment. But in my case I'm sure the dance shows will be all worth it and my behavior was completely rational.

Marathon Training

2007-09-09T18:04:00.000-04:00

Schedule called for 9 miles in 10:29.

I did 9 miles in Central Park in 1:27:45 which comes out to 9:45 a mile. I'm a little concerned that I'm running this far below what my splits are supposed to be, but I'm not running harder than what a long run pace should be (conversation pace). At first I thought that maybe that the times were going to get much faster later in the schedule, but they don't. I may be pushing myself too hard or the runners world training calculator grossly underestimated what I'm capable of (haha).

Marathon Training

2007-09-07T23:43:00.000-04:00

I experienced the first hitch in my training schedule, I skipped my workout yesterday (too tired after a long day at work), but made it up tonight:

Tempo run 7 miles total

2-mile warm up

4 miles at an 8:59 pace

My actual splits were:
1 in 9:01
1 in 8:38
1 in 8:48
1 in 8:21

1 mile cool down.

To be honest, the cool down was a mix of walking and jogging, actually running the cool down is getting harder and harder after my tempo runs, but I figure its still part of my mileage so I gotta work that out.

The Eye of Sauron

2007-09-04T21:11:00.000-04:00

It is Mr. Díaz’s achievement in this galvanic novel that he’s fashioned both a big picture window that opens out on the sorrows of Dominican history, and a small, intimate window that reveals one family’s life and loves.

Michiko Kakutani on Junot Díaz’s “Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao”

I guess this is why she gets paid the big big bucks to review books and I don't. She's prettty much summed what impressed me so much about the book which is how seamlessly Diaz manages to move from the big picture (the grand narrative of history to the small picture) the micro view and more importantly connect the two without privileging one over the other.

The way Trujillo dominates the lives of their characters makes me think of Park Chung Hee and the conflicted place he must hold in the psyche of many Koreans. On one hand, he's the father of modern Korea (try getting my father to say anything bad about him) and arguably the reason South Korea is not a third world country today, but at the same time a pretty damn Trujilloish dictator in his own right. Ironically, I didn't immediately think of the dictator to the North like the reviewer in the Voice did, calling Trujillio, the DR's very own Kim Jong Il. But I guess its easy to forget that it took some time for democratic elections to take root on the American client side of Korea too.

Marathon Training

2007-09-02T12:41:00.000-04:00

Did my long run today, was supposed to do 8 miles at 10:29 but I didn't have a timer but I did do 8 miles in Central Park this morning.

Footsie

2007-08-31T00:31:00.000-04:00

On the tape, Craig and the arresting officer can be heard arguing over what happened in the men's room minutes earlier. Craig acknowledges that the men's feet bumped but says nothing improper happened.

"Did we bump? Yes, I think we did. You said so. I don't disagree with that," Craig said.

I've taken ALOT of shits in my lifetime and I don't know how you could bump feet with someone in the stall next to you "by accident."

Oscar Wao is not Asian

2007-08-31T00:06:00.000-04:00

I just finished this and I want to read it a few more times, but I have to say I'm very impressed, especially considering the leap he made from Drown (we only had to wait some 10 years).

Drown was great, but still just a bunch of short stories, vignettes. What Diaz has done with "Brief..." is create an epic story spanning three generations, numerous cultures, races and much more. The shit he's managed to weave together is so much more ambitious than Drown and I think it works, especially the omnipresent shadow of Trujillo looming over all Dominicans like a Darth Vadar, Big Brother, Eye of Sauron etc. I was worried that like Nas with Illmatic, Diaz may not have had much left in his tank after (I think) spilling the guts of his entire life in one incredibly tight, successful and memorable piece that rocketed him to fame at a young age (like Nas with Illmatic), but I'm glad to see his evolution.

There was an interesting article in the last issue of Poets and Writers about how his early success made it hard for him to write again, but I think he's done it. Hopefully his next book won't take another decade.

NYC Marathon Training

2007-08-30T23:38:00.001-04:00

Tempo run:

2-mile warm up to Astoria Park Track

Supposed to do 3 miles at an 8:59 pace and did:

1 at 8:59
1 at 8:38
1 at 8:18

1-mile cool down (shuffle) back to my apartment.

Total: 6 miles

Gloria and Anil's Wedding

2007-08-28T01:12:00.000-04:00

I just spent the weekend in Portland Maine stuffing myself silly with seafood and watching my friends Anil and Gloria get married. It was a great weekend especially because it was a weekend out of town with a lot of my closest friends who are like an extended family to me. Here are some pics from my (shitty) camera phone. I've got to upgrade, I think I got some decent shots despite my technical limitations:

Marathon Training

2007-08-27T17:14:00.001-04:00

Correction on what I wrote earlier afternoon.

My long run was 7.32 (not 7.5) miles in 1:26 in Portland ME (I was there for Anil's
wedding). I was supposed to do them at a 10:29/mile pace so I was off
a bit. I also stopped a few times to check directions so that may
have been the reason. The first 4 miles are great because they are right along the water, first on the ocean, then in the back cove. The last 3 were a little confusing because my map print out was small and I wasn't sure where to turn at a bunch of points. Here is the course:

Courtesy mapmyrun.com

Hiking

2007-08-24T16:11:00.000-04:00

Went hiking with the fam today, lots of fun. Hariman State Park.

View Album

Get your own

Torqued Ellipses

2007-08-23T14:06:00.001-04:00

There's no gestalt reading. You don't know the form even if you walk around it several times. When you walk inside the piece, you become caught up in the movement of the surface and your movement in relation to its movement.

Richard Serra on Torqued Ellipses

Richard Serra is one of those giants of 20th Century art, whose work I'm embarrassed to admit, I've only experienced in slides and text books. I know about him through readings in art theory and case studies (Tilted Arc in the Federal Plaza). In my mind, he had devolved into the one-sentence you can use to quickly categorize a lot of artists (in his case, he was the white guy that did big steel sheets that pissed people off). But on a day trip to the Dia Beacon today, I had a chance to walk through Torqued Ellipses, one of his more notable works.

Incredible.

To move through them and feel the movement in and out of structures so stable and solid while you weave through yourself them was almost a spiritual experience. Light sneaks in creating a dramatic effect. The warm rust colors against the limited lighting reminded of how Mark Rothko had wanted his paintings to be a spiritual experience exhibited only in low light (one of his last projects was a chapel). The surfaces are incredibly painterly in their texture and colors. Even if they were flat they still would be beautiful. And apparently, just building the shit was an engineering feat in and of itself.

Wow, hell of an experience. Richard Serra, in my book, is now the white guy that does really cool big steel sheets that piss people off.

marathon workout

2007-08-23T11:05:00.001-04:00

This morning's workout-tempo run@ Astoria Park track

1.5 miles warm up
1600 mt 7:52
800 jog
1600 mt 8:15
800 jog
1.5 mile cool down

Was supposed do each mile at 8:24 and am still learning to pace myself-went out like gangbusters on the first one then gutted the second one. I assume that my goal for these should be to get the times close to each other at the right pace.

Workout-8/19/07

2007-08-19T12:54:00.000-04:00

I was supposed to do 6 miles at 10:29/mile and meet a co-worker at 8:00am for the run. But...I stayed out a little too late last night for a friend's birthday party and slept through my alarm and got there really late and she had (understandably) took off without me. I cut across the park and caught her at about mile 3. I ended up doing the whole 6 at what felt like a 10:00 clip but I didn't have a time so you'll have to trust me.

NYC Marathon Training Kick Off

2007-08-18T11:49:00.000-04:00

I'm training for the NYC Marathon and I'll be logging workouts here to keep myself on track. I downloaded a training schedule on RunnersWorld which has a handy training calculator that lets you plug in some variables to give you a personalized schedule. I was a little alarmed that its only two days a week, but the mileage makes sense and as long as a I stick to the intervals and do cross training on off days hopefully I will be ok. Here's the schedule. Its based on my:

Most recent half marathon time: 2:00
Weekly running base going into the training period: 10-15 miles/week
Target Race: Full Marathon
Race date: Nov 4, 2007
How hard do you want to train? Hard
Long run day: Sunday

My first official work out was last Thursday morning, a tempo run. I'm not used to running against an interval, but I did it:

1 mile warm up (my house to Astoria track)
1 mile 8:30 (on the track)
1 mile 8:30 (on the track)
1 mile 8:40 (on the track)
1 mile cool down (back home)

Tomorrow:
6 miles at 10:29 in Central Park.

For those of you interested, my cross-training is 2-3 dance classes/week (African and Salsa). I'd like to add in a 3rd running work out a week to do drills. I need to add in some strength training.

Presidential Politics

2007-05-28T13:02:00.000-04:00

From the latest issue of Business Week

Maria Bartiromo:
How is America perceived around the world?

John McCain:
It's worse probably than it has ever been. When I'm President, I will close Guantánamo Bay. I will address climate change in the most serious fashion. And we will never torture another person being held in detention. And I would be humble.

Not that I'm rooting for the Republicans to win this next presidential election, but I am discouraged that the one Republican candidate that seems to have any real intergrity and not just flip flop himself to appeal to a conservative base (see: Romney, Giuliani), is again going to lose to a candidate who is full of shit (Giuliani) but extremely well-funded. After reading that interview I check out McCain's wikipedia page to see the extent to which he had been tortured as a POW and the shit was bananas.

Apparently he also once joked, "why is Chelsea Clinton so ugly? Because her father is Janet Reno."