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Post by Deleted on Feb 6, 2010 21:38:38 GMT
(This is totally illegal, by the way -- probably illegal in a whole lot of cities in the world. Forbidden to feed the pigeons!)
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Post by rikita on Feb 7, 2010 2:28:43 GMT
cool pictures of the pigeons!
kinda late again for starting a thread. but one of these days i will manage to log in earlier and then i will do it...
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Post by bixaorellana on Feb 7, 2010 4:21:24 GMT
I'm going to the "sound around you thread" to record the thrumming of my fingers, Rikita. Kerouac, those are just wonderful pictures -- I mean as photographs in & of themselves, besides being interesting local color. I also admire your forbearance in standing that close to the flying rats to get the pics.
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Post by bixaorellana on Feb 17, 2010 18:08:36 GMT
This is local color in the form of local custom. When someone dies, a black fabric bow is affixed to the front of the person's home. I've never known what the time limit is for leaving the bows up, only that there are an awful lot of weather-beaten bows on houses all around here. Interestingly, each bow is exactly the same in general form. This bow has lost all of its black color.
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Post by hwinpp on Mar 2, 2010 10:45:00 GMT
Local Cambodian colour, very popular, but not a pic: ACCUSED RAPIST, VICTIM WON’T MARRY Police are on the lookout for a 23-year-old accused rapist after a 24-year-old woman in Kampot province was assaulted last Monday. The alleged attack happened when the woman stepped out of her neighbour’s house to retrieve discs to continue watching a film. Police said the woman’s parents had discussed marrying the pair off, but the man’s parents refused. Now the woman’s parents have filed a complaint with local authorities. www.phnompenhpost.com/index.php/2010030232888/National-news/police-blotter-2-mar-2010.html
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Post by Deleted on Mar 4, 2010 6:39:34 GMT
Bixa, when I first moved to France, part of the whole undertaking procedure in Paris was for the undertakers to drape the entire building door frame in black velvet, with the family initial for a small supplement. But that was when bodies were still kept at home for the wake, and the entire room would be draped in black as well.
I haven't seen that in years. Perhaps you can't have wakes at home anymore, or perhaps people just don't want to. The world has moved on. Hide death and turn the page as quickly as possible in the developed world.
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Post by bixaorellana on Mar 7, 2010 2:36:48 GMT
How very old-fashioned! And that was as recently as the 70s or 80s, wasn't it? There are funeral homes with "viewing" salons here, but I think most people still have the wake at home. There are lots of rituals involved that are definitely pre-hispanic. The deceased is waked for three nights at home. During that time, relatives and neighbors are led in prayer and song by a professional hired for the occasion. Afterward, the family serves sweet bread and chocolate to the guests. Usually there is beer and mescal is ceremoniously passed around. Often there is a tapete (rug) on the floor in front of the coffin, but made of colored sand ( example here, although this is one of the large outdoor ones for display during Days of the Dead) After nine days the sand is gathered by "godfathers" and everyone returns to the cemetery for another ceremony wherein the sand is interred in the dirt of the grave.
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Post by cristina on Mar 7, 2010 3:25:13 GMT
Every place that I have lived, there has been enough diversity that local color is always diluted.
But the posts about funerals, along with Spindrifts thread about cremation have me thinking about my brother's funeral, almost 8 years ago.
He died unexpectedly, in Viet Nam. My other brother and I had to split tasks so I flew back to Washington to be with our mother and my brother flew to Ho Chi Min City or Saigon (take your pick) to tend to the serious task of identification and the events that followed.
Transporting a body is prohibitively expensive, so it became evident that cremation was the only option if his remains were to be returned to the US. My mother was adamant that he have a Catholic funeral Mass before he was cremated.
Hence, with the incredible assistance of the US State Dept (to whom I will be forever grateful, btw), my brother was able to arrange a funeral at the Basilica de Notre Dame, attended by the State Dept personnel who helped us, along with a gloriously flashy contingent from the Vietnamese family who had "adopted"my younger brother.
My brother "in charge" hired a videographer (its a good thing I wasn't in charge because I would not have thought to have done this...it ended up being a really good thing for our mother). The funeral mass was really lovely - maybe even better than had it been in our hometown.
But...you were waiting for local color, right? This was unfortunately not videotaped since my brother had no idea that there would be a ritual, or even anything to see so he let the videographer go early . Because cremations in the US are apparently always behind closed doors.
My brother's casket was transported to the cremation site, where there was a Dixie-land style band playing. The entire cremation ceremony was as important as the funeral mass that has preceded it. An altar had been set up with images of my brother along with remembrances of him. Everyone was there to watch the casket move along into the fire.
My bother said this was the most fascinating mix of Catholic/Buddhist/+ something unidentifiable that he had ever witnessed. Who knew that Dixie-land jazz might show up in Saigon?
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Post by bixaorellana on Mar 7, 2010 3:56:39 GMT
What an amazing story, Cristina. You answered what would have been my first question -- if the video was psychologically helpful for you mother. Believe it or not, I may have a partial answer, or at least a theory about the music played at the cremation. It sounds a very great deal like the jazz funerals of New Orleans. If you read this article, note that in the second paragraph it says, "The tradition arises from African spiritual practices, French and Spanish martial musical traditions." (my italics) Could it be that some form of brass band music at funerals came in with the French to Vietnam and somehow the custom came to resemble the second part of a jazz funeral in a city with French roots far from Saigon? amended to add ~~ here is a good example of the sad music played on the way to the cemetery, with the music that would come after: listen.grooveshark.com/#/s/Just+a+Closer+Walk+With+Thee+New+Second+Line/kKHED
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Post by cristina on Mar 7, 2010 6:34:06 GMT
Bixa, I expected French and Catholic influences in Viet Nam, although possibly not to this degree. I was just surprised by the music.
The sense I got from my brother attending this was that there was almost a religious confusion, or perhaps weird confluence.
I liked it though. We were raised as Catholics, but my younger brother tended more towards Buddhism as an adult, so this ritual was likely the best celebration of his life, I think.
Is this type of music typically played at funerals anywhere outside of Louisiana?
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Post by Deleted on Mar 7, 2010 6:52:36 GMT
The cathedral in Saigon is a lovely place. If one must have a funeral, it would be a great location.
One thing that fascinated me in some of the Buddhist temples that I visited in Saigon were the big cabinets of funeral urns behind glass. They looked quite like funeral urns anywhere, except that they all had a photograph of the deceased on the front in an oval frame. The urns are taken out for special family ceremonies from time to time.
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Post by gertie on Mar 11, 2010 17:20:50 GMT
casimira, now just where can I find this MizzAlice and buy some of those lovely things she has in her basket? Reminds me of when I was younger, I worked in a large office building with several offices. An older lady and her husband would stop by toward the end of each month and sell bags containing tea cakes, big sugar cookies, and sweet potato pies to make ends meet til the end of the month. We all used to take care to have cash for the day.
Local color on my block has rather been set back since the neighbor finally had to give in and put his wife in a home due to her Alzheimer's worsening. For a while there she would show up at my house with odd gifts (one sock in a lovely box complete with beautiful bow) or wanting to sell an odd item (Obviously used little plastic strand with plastic clips for drying delicate items over the tub, a box of dominoes with half missing) or I would see her wandering and catch her for a chat (she was hurrying to pick up her son, who is older than I from the elementary across the street from my house, thinking he was still a student, the saddest part being it wasn't even a school day). Bless her heart, she was a sweet thing, but she developed an inclination to run around at night time and my neighbor could simply no longer keep up with her.
As for local color in our greater metropolis, I will have to dig out the picture I took when we first moved here of a gentleman riding his horse through a Whataburger drive through (think McDo's, it is a similar chain). When it warms up, I will get a picture from a popular nearby watering hole of horses tied up at the hitching post, waiting for their owners. You see, we have strict drunk driving laws but there is no drunk horse riding law in Texas, though you might get arrested for public intoxication if you were to become bellicose or obstreperous.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 20, 2010 23:18:44 GMT
Ikea did something very strange in the metro recently as part of their advertising campaign.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 21, 2010 6:58:32 GMT
Yesterday I saw that Serge Gainsbourg's tomb in the Montparnasse cemetery is as popular as ever. The diverse items are in reference to some of his most famous songs.
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Post by bjd on Mar 21, 2010 7:10:32 GMT
Clever advertising by Ikea.
A couple of years ago I walked through Montparnasse cemetery and there was a woman cleaning Gainsbourg's tomb. There was a lot less stuff on it though.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 21, 2010 16:26:15 GMT
When are we going to get a glimpse of the Parisian "Christmas Tree Lady?" we've been hearing about?
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Post by Deleted on Mar 21, 2010 16:43:13 GMT
I have not seen her for quite some time.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 21, 2010 17:58:30 GMT
How's this for a colorful mailbox?
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Post by Deleted on Mar 21, 2010 18:03:55 GMT
Not a Chevy fan, eh?
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Post by Deleted on Mar 21, 2010 18:07:17 GMT
I don't think they are, no. Not my mailbox btw.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 30, 2010 17:38:18 GMT
Do you want to take the metro at rush hour?
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Post by Kimby on Mar 31, 2010 13:56:20 GMT
(How did you get a picture with no one scowling at you for pointing a camera at them?)
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Post by Deleted on Apr 2, 2010 9:42:12 GMT
I will try and get a similar shot in NYC and we can compare if there's much comparison at all to be made. Will be interesting. Is this the metro you ride most days to work Kerouac?
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Post by Deleted on Apr 6, 2010 11:45:23 GMT
That's the metro I ride home from work (line 2). I ride line 12 to work.
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Post by Deleted on Apr 6, 2010 11:47:07 GMT
(How did you get a picture with no one scowling at you for pointing a camera at them?) The metro is so full of tourists that we are photographed all the time.
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Post by Deleted on May 4, 2010 3:08:22 GMT
I have been trying to catch this lady for a long time. She is a real local character,usually has a dog in her bike basket. She is about 80 plus years old,lives up on the river.(don't know where the dog is...).
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Post by Deleted on May 4, 2010 5:08:00 GMT
That's great. The baskets would seem to indicate that it is her primary vehicle.
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Post by fumobici on May 4, 2010 15:34:41 GMT
Sweet. I hope I'm riding my bike around and making people point and talk when I'm 80 something. That photo speaks of a life well lived.
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Post by Deleted on May 4, 2010 19:46:52 GMT
Saw her again today,so uncanny. Yes,her baskets are usually crammed with stuff (and the dog). I hope to be doing as well too, Fumobici, at her age. If I see her again soon and am able to get a pic she is going in the Cycling in the City thread!!!
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Post by bixaorellana on May 6, 2010 15:37:09 GMT
Maybe an interview, hmmm?
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