Newbie (very) question

snipped-for-privacy@xprt.net/11/04 20: snipped-for-privacy@xprt.net

My overly extensive experience with things Japanese -- which I will decidedly not share here -- Crymad is on the money, if I understand him correctly: It's the spirit of the thing that counts most; the rules are a supporting structure, at best made to be broken when the spirit demands.

Hope this helps.

Michael

Michael PlantBD6B1C1C.1D5A1% snipped-for-privacy@pipeline.com/13/04

09: snipped-for-privacy@pipeline.com

snipped-for-privacy@xprt.net/11/04 20: snipped-for-privacy@xprt.net

From my overly extensive experience with things Japanese -- which I will decidedly not share here -- Crymad is on the money, if I understand him correctly: It's the spirit of the thing that counts most; the rules are a supporting structure, at best made to be broken when the spirit demands.

Hope this helps.

Michael

Sasha,

If one weren't such a damnable purist, one could have fierce intellectual battle over gungfu. Come to New York and we'll show you how we canabalize and bastardize the most venerated traditions. (I hope this does't offend.)

Misha

Alex ChaihorskyUdn0d.13926$ snipped-for-privacy@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com9/10/04

15: snipped-for-privacy@nowhere.com

Sasha has been here for a couple of posts and is already using standard Usenet obfuscation argumentative tactics. So he's been around. This group is rife with hit and run tea posters. They babble to themselves then disappear. So it remains to be seen how much he will contribute. There are the old timers who stick around and contribute their two cents worth. There are divergent opinions so using gongfu as an example. I subscribe to the camp it is a service and not a ceremony. To be brutal I've never seen a gongfu service where someone isn't selling you something. You buy the gongfu service on the way out or buy some outlandish expensive tea. I've never been to a restaurant and seen a Japanese Tea Ceremony. I go once a year too our local Cherry Blossom festival and see it performed in a gazebo. You just watch. Nothing is explained. There are no schedules. You are in the right place at the right time. If you need a reservation you'll never understand. Take it from a old timer pay attention and learn something and don't take sides thinking there is a correct answer. Crymad has his Japanese connections as do several other people. Several of us have traveled the world also. My observations are gleamed from local ethnic communities and if Sasha ever gets lonely he can visit our local Russian community. Sometimes I'm afraid too. I wished I had access to Lexus\Nexus to see reports about Japanese prisoner populations in Russia from WWII. There is a parallel in Britain where German prisoners did not return to the motherland. The bottom line nothing to go back too. The biggest strength in this ng are the shared obervations and sometimes we politely agree to disagree. I've had my share of shouting matches but then I'm the self appointed curmudgeon. Age has it's privileges.

Jim

put on your earmuffs chainsaw in use "Dave" wrote in message news:...

My guess Kabbalah. If you pass time you're going faster than the speed of light. If the universe does collapse then the future will occur before the past.

Jim

It is not being a purist (which I am not) but following myself. What I discovered about myself is that taste (palate) excites me and scent - pacifies me. As soon as I smell the tea in chahe, I fell deep down into myself and lose all interest in serious discussions. That is why 100% traditional places like Roy's Imperial in Chinatown, SF suit me so well - there is very little talk and people do bring their bird cages for the birds to drink tea and sing and it if perfect. But only if I do gongfu. I would be bored to death in the same atmosphere during a restaurant dinner.

Thanks for an invitation, but since one cold night in February 2002 NY has become a very sad place for me and will forever be that way. I do not think I will be capable of any intellectual effort in NY at all.

Sasha.

Sasha,

No mention of "intellectual effort" in NY at all. We frown upon it. Just tea of the very best. Sorry about your 2/02 experience, whatever it was. On the ITC thing, I suppose the quiet would be disquieting.

M

Alex ChaihorskyIhj1d.15032$ snipped-for-privacy@newssvr21.news.prodigy.com9/13/04

11: snipped-for-privacy@nowhere.com

Dave answered:

Since I seem to be specializing in off-topic posts lately, let me say that this reminds me of the title of Vivaldi's opus 8 (I think it's 8) collection of wonderful concerti, including The Famous Four (Seasons): "A contest between harmony and invention". Out of such contests come beauty.

Best,

Rick.

You've got to be kidding. Have you ever even been to Japan?

--crymad

No I am not kidding. I studied Japan. I have many friends who lived there for years, both legally and undercover. An older friend of mine was wartime US military intelligence station officer in Japan. I worked with Japanese in Asia, Europe and America. My grandfather was a chief medical officer in the field Soviet hospital in Manchuria during infamous Soviet invasion into Manchuria, and later in Japan (1945-46). And as of today I am deep to my ears in developing vaccines for Koi fish that are Japanese national treasure and are dying by millions because of the new virus. I may be wrong in my assessments, you may have stronger arguments to the opposite, but no, I am not kidding anyone.

Sasha.

Alex ChaihorskyWqr1d.19227$ snipped-for-privacy@newssvr27.news.prodigy.com9/13/04

21: snipped-for-privacy@nowhere.com

Major snippage of ramble having nothing whatsoever to do with tea

snip snap

Sasha my friend,

Give it up. The USSR had the good sense to take itself off line. Besides, on this side of the puddle we think it's piddle. Speaking of which, let's get back to tea.

Miles Davis in Big Red Robe

Michael

If nothing else Nintendo will make sure it doesn't happen. Public posturing is good for TV. Russia won't return to Communism, Germany won't return to Nationalism, Japan won't return to Militarism. Visit the history groups and get your fill of each side. If I'm Bin Laden I'll destabilize Russia enough for somebody to give me a WMD for payback at the West for cold war humiliation or American military success in Afghanistan. If you want to dominate the world become an American. I never saw Japanese or Chinese products in each other's stores until last ten years. The Chinese business man who started the national Asian supermarket chain stocks more Japanese tea than Chinese.

Jim

Girly? Girly? Me? Impossible. Why, I can take square roots in my head. I can list several Moravingian kings. Who could ask for more in a man?

Now we're getting somewhere. My biblical name is Aryeh, anglicized as Leon, which in turn makes Lev, right? And isn't that finally a butch name?

Although the Hasids might call me a Litvak because I prefer logic over alcohol, no. It is Belorussian (at least his home town was in Belorus at the time when my grandfather fled for his life - I believe that it changed ownership frequently, which was a big part of the problem).

Ob tea/Russia: I have been trying to use my samovar with various kinds of tea. Caucasian black - of course, the best; green - okay if you empty the zavarka with each steep, which kind of defeats the purpose; oolong - ditto (though for it and green it can still be a convenient way to brew); black pu erh - great, it doesn't mind oversteeping.

Rick.

Rick - :) :) :) Lev is not a real butch name because in Russia 99% of Levs are Jewish boychiks with beards and thick glasses with degrees in math. Not really that butchy crowd. I guess their parents named them Lev because they thought it was a butch name, but they overdid it :) I have never met a Russian Russian guy named Lev. However the Chief's counterintellegence guy for famous Ukrainian anarchist leader Nestor Makhno (

) name was Lev Zadov and he was the butches butch butch. That may help a bit. Anyway, Lev (Lyova, Lyovka) is a good Russian name slightly spoiled by Leiba Bronshtein (Lev Trotsky that is here known as Leon Trotsky). You decide.

And for the purists here - yes its off-topic. Behead me..

Sasha.

Piddle... I see. May be you are right, but I think that precisely because you think its piddle, we are in Iraq today. I do not want to waste your off-topic tolerance on me, so just allow me to post this reference, as I promised:

U.S. Congress, House of Representatives, Committee on Un-American Activities, Hearings on American Aspects of the Richard Sorge Spy Case,

82nd Congress, First Session, (Washingotn: Government Printing Office, 1951) pp. 1198-99.

And a link to the page of Prof Kubek (Univ. of Dallas) "Communism at Perl Harbour"

Enjoy your tea.

Sasha.

That would be an ultra-butch haircut.

/Lew

You must have hired a private eye! You didn't mention - do they like to play chess?

And how about Tolstoy? Wasn't Tolstoy butch? (I see a thesis topic here).

Rick.

I think chess became less popular after the birth of PC (its a better toy, IMHO) Also the fact that today machine beats human champ played its role lately. Fisher's variant is a good try, but I prefer shogi. Was Tolstoy a butch? N-aaah. No more than Lincoln.

Sasha.