Beneath the wool of her coat Myrna’s skinny shoulder feels like the knobby end of an old man’s cane. Who knows what people must think, the way you stumble towards the road, hiding your bloody face in the crook of your sleeve? Some of the voices sound alarmed. Some laugh. Amidst the bustle around you, you wonder if the fishermen are about to come up behind you again.
"It’s not in Communist China. It’s not in Castro’s Cuba. It isn’t in Laos or North Korea or Cambodia or Tokyo or Nagasaki or Iraq. No! It is not in any of the countries bombed to bloody toothpicks by B-Five-Hundred-and-Fifty-Twos. No! The best health care in the world is right here under our nose" - which is to say, just north of the 49th parallel. I paid $600 last year for universal health care. Go Leafs Go!
It's good to hear such an outpouring of old fashioned patriotism, sir. Yes, Canada has excellent health care and over 29,000 Grizzly bears. The tour guide was aware of these facts and, in the quotation above, she was probably being just little bit sarcastic, trying to get any kind of reaction from the indifferent crowd... I don't know exactly what she was thinking but I know how she feels.
“After the victory in Vietnam” has to be her most sarcastic comment. But she didn’t actually identify the victor..fill in the blank based on your personal mode of indoctrination. (Now, I am the sarcastic one)
That's a good point and I was thinking after I posted this that maybe it should have been "our victory in Vietnam," which highlights her internal conflict more. I imagine the love/hate feelings a vietnamese american (or refugee from any US war) might feel as she tries to educate an apathetic crowd of incurious tourists about her adopted country. I saw a show at an art museum recently (John Singer Sargent) with a painting of the interior of a hospital in Spain with the patients lying on the ground. The card next to the painting explained that in the 19th Century, hospitals were common tourist destinations! People are attracted to views of suffering I guess. Anyway, Neville's trip to the hospital will get even more lively before he gets discharged.
May 11, 2023·edited May 11, 2023Liked by Ruben Bix
I went to the Sargent show. I think the explanation was that hospitals there at that time were in historical buildings of significant architecture (non-Brutal). The fact that they were populated by patients that were war veterans was coincidental.
The card (and by the way, I usually don't read these cards) said: "While hospitals are not considered tourist destinations today, popular guidebooks in Sargent's era extolled the...architecture of significant renaissance buildings such as the 16th-centurey Hospital of Saint John of God... So the scene at St Sulpice fits into this tradition. Saying people were attracted to suffering is just me being cynical, but we are attracted to suffering. Just look at the news. This is a different point but, when I go to see paintings, I want to try to see what the painter was seeing and maybe intuit what he/she was doing, and I want to think my own thoughts not the damn curator's. It drives me nuts. Some of the museum shows I've seen have started making moral judgements about the subject of paintings as well. This is a bad trend and it's coming from the left as well as the right.
Ha. you know, that Amharic text was a last minute inspiration. (Inspiration Information?!) I was thinking nobody would know what the hell that was about and, wouldn't you know it, the first commenter of the day decoded it no problem! Kudos on your jazz knowledge.
I feel like adding some blood to my avatar in solidarity with Neville.
...better an unwounded avatar. You could jinx yourself.
Challenge accepted. I'll do it tomorrow on the 13th. If only it were Friday.
I love all the faces in your illustration, some almost clear and some just a suggestion of a face.
What if all those faces in the illustration are the writer’s impression of us, the readers? And Myrna wants to know what the F*** we’re doing there!
Actually, all these people live in a shoe box in the back of my closet.
I'm in there among the crowd.
"It’s not in Communist China. It’s not in Castro’s Cuba. It isn’t in Laos or North Korea or Cambodia or Tokyo or Nagasaki or Iraq. No! It is not in any of the countries bombed to bloody toothpicks by B-Five-Hundred-and-Fifty-Twos. No! The best health care in the world is right here under our nose" - which is to say, just north of the 49th parallel. I paid $600 last year for universal health care. Go Leafs Go!
your schadenfreudelich Cannuck
It's good to hear such an outpouring of old fashioned patriotism, sir. Yes, Canada has excellent health care and over 29,000 Grizzly bears. The tour guide was aware of these facts and, in the quotation above, she was probably being just little bit sarcastic, trying to get any kind of reaction from the indifferent crowd... I don't know exactly what she was thinking but I know how she feels.
“After the victory in Vietnam” has to be her most sarcastic comment. But she didn’t actually identify the victor..fill in the blank based on your personal mode of indoctrination. (Now, I am the sarcastic one)
That's a good point and I was thinking after I posted this that maybe it should have been "our victory in Vietnam," which highlights her internal conflict more. I imagine the love/hate feelings a vietnamese american (or refugee from any US war) might feel as she tries to educate an apathetic crowd of incurious tourists about her adopted country. I saw a show at an art museum recently (John Singer Sargent) with a painting of the interior of a hospital in Spain with the patients lying on the ground. The card next to the painting explained that in the 19th Century, hospitals were common tourist destinations! People are attracted to views of suffering I guess. Anyway, Neville's trip to the hospital will get even more lively before he gets discharged.
I went to the Sargent show. I think the explanation was that hospitals there at that time were in historical buildings of significant architecture (non-Brutal). The fact that they were populated by patients that were war veterans was coincidental.
The card (and by the way, I usually don't read these cards) said: "While hospitals are not considered tourist destinations today, popular guidebooks in Sargent's era extolled the...architecture of significant renaissance buildings such as the 16th-centurey Hospital of Saint John of God... So the scene at St Sulpice fits into this tradition. Saying people were attracted to suffering is just me being cynical, but we are attracted to suffering. Just look at the news. This is a different point but, when I go to see paintings, I want to try to see what the painter was seeing and maybe intuit what he/she was doing, and I want to think my own thoughts not the damn curator's. It drives me nuts. Some of the museum shows I've seen have started making moral judgements about the subject of paintings as well. This is a bad trend and it's coming from the left as well as the right.
I like the Ethiopian influences in this chapter. The reference to EthioJazz and the Amharic script at the end, “Spread it like butter”.
Ha. you know, that Amharic text was a last minute inspiration. (Inspiration Information?!) I was thinking nobody would know what the hell that was about and, wouldn't you know it, the first commenter of the day decoded it no problem! Kudos on your jazz knowledge.