Arthur Again

Having not seen Arthur, the Bali dog, for what must have been some three weeks now, I had decided that he must surely have become either roadkill or someone's dinner. Imagine my surprise, then, when he showed up this morning during my customary walk with the big fat brown dog! 

"Arthur!" I sung out. 

Arthur ignored me. 

"Arthur, come here, boy." 

Arthur gives me a sidelong glance. 

"Umm … do I know you?"

"Do you know me? Of course you know me. You were at my house every day twice a day for nearly a month!"

"Likely story." 

"I gave you sausage every morning." 

"Sausage?" Arthur says, betraying the first sign of real interest. 

So Arthur followed us back home, to see, I suppose, if there was anything to this intriguing mention of sausage. 

We shall see how long his friendship lasts this time. Or how long his memory persists. 

Meme

I happened this morning to see the following meme posted on Facebook: 

"Illegal refugees receive $3,874 per month from the Government".

Apparently this has been floating around Facebook for a while now and I had merely been fortunate enough not to see it. 

Now, my first thought when I see statements such as this one is "Really?" And so I check the statement to see whether it is true or false, especially given that it would surely strike most thinking people as false from the get-go.  Checking such statements is exceedingly easy nowadays, given the glut over the last few years of 'fake' news, Russian trolls, divisive stories, conspiracy theories and so forth. One merely need type the meme into his search engine, which will then produce a debunking of the story from fact gathering sites devoted to debunking false stories. 

As it turns out, there are three rather major problems with what is stated in the meme; 

1) The stated payment concerns policy in Canada, not in the US. 
2)  "Refugees" are not considered 'illegal' in any western democracy, and 
3)  The money was a one-time payment not to an individual but to a family of five and not a monthly stipend. 

In other words, this, like most memes, is bullshit. 

It seems curious to me that even when so much attention has been given to viral falsehoods such as this, when so much free education has been published regarding their existence and the dangers they pose, people continue to brainlessly re-post rather than investigate first for themselves.  Of course, this is because people are inclined to think what they want to think rather than to seek the truth, because the truth may conflict with their prejudices and paranoias. 

But that's really not a good excuse, is it.

Nonetheless, this will be repeated ad infinitum, just as Trump tirelessly repeats his lies (biggest inauguration crowd ever). 

What strange, what irritating times we live in. 

Chocolate!

I am the fortunate recipient today of a gift from America—a two-tier box of See’s Chocolates, all creams or caramels, just as I like it! This may not seem a very big deal, but you must understand that they have no such a thing in Bali. What they have, masquerading as chocolate bars, is an assortment of offerings that are distinctly not chocolate, regardless of the pretense. What these are actually made of, I am not sure. They are brown, but there is where any reasonable relationship with chocolate ends. Although, to be fair, I will say that the situation has improved just a bit in the last 8 years. The Snickers bar is now generally available, and at an affordable price, and I did see 2-pack of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups the other day, although at quite an unaffordable price—about 10 dollars US! But fine boxed chocolates such as See’s are quite unknown in these parts.

Other favorites of mine that are generally unavailable include Poptarts. I get my supply of these, when possible, from visiting friends from Australia. I did see my first ever box of Poptarts in one of the high end markets here the other day, but, again, at an absolutely silly price approaching 20 dollars.

Among other things unavailable in Bali are pancakes. There are restaurants which “claim” to have pancakes, like one called “Funny Pancake”, and that’s just what they are: Funny. These come smothered in whipped cream and little decorative chewy candies, and I was once served ketchup with my pancakes as well. Yes, ketchup. Although much is  lacking in tradition western sweets in Indonesia, they are very big on ketchup, which is served with pretty much everything. Including soup.

If you want to make pancakes at home, you must choose between one available mix, a very thin, sandy stuff that is apparently mostly dried milk and sugar, or make your own from scratch (in which case, good luck with finding baking powder, baking soda, or buttermilk. In fact, forget the buttermilk. There is no such thing here).

There is a waffle place not far from my house, so that’s a step in the right direction—but it is just waffles, and Belgian waffles at that—and but a trickle of syrup is applied in the kitchen before the plate comes out, as maple syrup here is as expensive as … well, as expensive as Poptarts.

There is very little in the way of microwaveable foods (which may be because very few people own a microwave). There is, however, microwave popcorn—which I’m sure I would enjoy if I had any teeth to speak of.

Other things that cannot be had? Let’s see … hashbrown potatoes, toaster waffles, affordable margarine, normal, affordable ice cream, affordable ice cream toppings. They do have rice, however (not rice-a-roni) and it is quite cheap. And it just so happens that people here eat quite a bit of rice. Every day. With everything. In fact, with your MacDonald’s burger or with your KFC order, you receive a ball of rice wrapped in paper.

So, in any case, I am in heaven today with my box of See’s Chocolates.

I’m also beginning to have a stomachache.

Time Then and Now

When you think about it, as I've been doing just now, the amount of damage one can do in his own life, even when so much of his time is occupied with working full-time, raising children, and so on, is really pretty amazing. Somehow, we are able to find that rare slice of free time to devote to the purpose of irreparable self destruction. Ah youth! Conversely, when one is old and retired and has an overabundance of time on his hands (not mentioning any names), it seems that he can no longer so expertly manage anywhere near his former aptitude for self-inflicted catastrophe. Not that I'm complaining. I don't like catastrophe any more than anyone else. It just seems strange that when we have so little time at our disposal we should be able to do so very much more damage with it than we are able to accomplish with all the time in the world. Where did we find the energy? Successfully pouring a bowl of cereal seems sufficiently taxing for me nowadays. And then what to do with the thing when I've finished eating? Before nightfall, that is. Carefully executed betrayals, remarkably thoroughgoing indiscretions, faultlessly executed  blunders seem wholly beyond my strength or grasp just now. All considered, I wish they always had been.

Bad News in General

My flu, rather than continuing to grow better, changed gears and became lousier today, such that I ended up spending most of the day in the house watching news shows online about our ailing government, which also became markedly lousier today with new revelations of crime and corruption and evasion and hush money and conspiracy--and oh, by the way, that's just the tip of the iceberg. There really seems no bottom to this mountain of shit. The one moment of relief in all this oppressive news was when one commentator envisioned a tragicomedy musical in the future featuring titles such as No Collusion, Truth is Not Truth, and Without Me Everyone Would be Very Poor.

I guess the good news would be that this farce does seem to be winding down--but then again, I thought it was winding down ever since before the election, so who can say? 

To make things worse, the wrenching fits of coughing that have come with this flu have exacerbated the pain in my right neck and shoulder which had finally, after two years, begun to get so much better, for the coughing has required the excessive use of compromised muscles that have been at the center of the dysfunction from the outset.   

Woe is me. 

The Return of the Little Mermaid

It was a pleasure yesterday to see young Ratih again, who has now finished her stewardess training course for Garuda Airlines in Jakarta and will be officially beginning her career next week--flying, to begin with, among the Indonesian islands, and then later throughout Southeast Asia. Sadly, this training period was attended also by a lamentable indiscretion, which has led to her separation from my friend Hendra; but all seems well nonetheless and they are now non-bitter friends. Sounds familiar. Ratih herself is bubbly as ever, full of hugs and smiles, and looking forward to an exciting career of exotic travels. I call the photo below "The Return of the Little Mermaid".

Rich People Problems

I've begun to read this--book three in the series by Kevin Kwan, which began with Crazy Rich Asians. Like the first two, this is a consistently entertaining read, though hardly a profound experience. The novels do, however, provide the reader with an intimate look into the lives and lifestyles of the very (very) rich. These are the rich people, in short, who even the rich think of as rich (and think themselves, in comparison, poor). The stories examine both the astounding vacuity of riches as well as the irrepressible intrusion of what is really very 'common'--such as love and tragedy and longing--into what may have seemed unassailable opulence, a purchased immunity to mere mediocrity. Kwan writes well, with an engaging, pointed sense of humor, and, rather magically, makes us care about the careless and the clueless.