Forgot to include my June 11 ST article: Behind the eight ball EdStephens of this page sometime ago brought out a list of 8 verbs. I wondered how he got to 8 rather than lucky 7,9, or 11. He is not even Chinese thoughhe wrestles the Hanzi down whose wordfor 8 is ba, a homonym for "happinessand prosperity", explaining to the curious the preponderance of 8 inchoices of P. O. Box numbers and vehicular tags in Sinosphere and Saipan. Wecount by base-10, the decimal system. Base-2,binary count using 0 and 1 is reliable but cumbersome; photo editing usesbase-16, hexidecimal, that has digits 0 to 9 followed by the letter A to F forthe first sixteen, then, 10 to 19 followed by 1A to 1F plus 20, for the next 16. We shy away from those exact languages andstick to rugged human discourse, imprecise as that is. Tardigrada or Waterbear, the creature in thethe Language Studios of Shenyang and Saipan I am associated with, is an eight-leggedmicroorganism. Spiders have the samenumber of legs. Society also keeps 8-countsand 8-shapes close to its chest. The ladyat the beach is a figure 8, horizontal 8 is "infinity", and a reclining8 takes minds to jaded shadows! Base-8is a system of counting that uses an eight-digit system, 0 to 7. Numbers "8" and "9" do notexist, digits are as follows: 0 to 7 are the first eight, the next is basedoubled (8.8=64), and the next is cubed (8.8.8=512), then, to the fourth(8.8.8.8=4096), fifth, sixth, and however far one's calculating machine cantake it. This is a way of thinking that acomputer game programmer utilizes, though if you ask me how it works, we move swiftlyon to the next topic. Thelate William Buckley, the Rapier Wit of the Right, TV host, prodigious writerwho founded one of America's conservative rags, had 8 verboten phrases for political journalists. I lived within D.C.'s beltway before he died,and though I was sympathetic to his way of thinking because he encouraged individualsto work out their own thoughts and be accountable for their deeds, we differedon the consequences of our resolves. Buckley chose 8 forthe number of no-no words; he could have conveniently chosen 10. His conservatively held resolves wereculturally conditioned rather than a consequence of clear thinking, IMHO! His choice of 8 rather than the decimal 10,however, revealed to me a mind whose leanings was towards poetry more than thestrictures of objective science, my kind of thinker. His rantsagainst government stems from a distrust of group-think shown by the elitistinstitutions in his neighborhood, Yale and Harvard, thus, abandoning any effortto join it. Conversely, I relished beingin groupthink to influence and often subvert it, with wild logic and wayward deeds. EvenKalihi-bred former Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hanneman of German-Samoan descent whojust began writing for ST's opinion page "as Marianas matters" notes inhis bio that he was Harvard-educated, though I was more impressed that he was aKiwi in NZ at Wellington University. Thelate Buckminster Fuller once said: You never change things by fightingexisting reality. To change something,build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete. Wewelcome the Honolulu Mayor into the ST table! We, too, think the Marianas matters. We work on changing models. "Eight"is also the street word for 3.5 grams of forbidden crystals, costly at theincarceration end more than on the overdose front. Buckley once suggested that if drugs werepriced at market rate, it would be 90 times cheaper than priced at the blackmarket. Not supportive of the use of drugs,nonetheless, he favored unrestricted markets for its sale! Eightball is a humorous comic book byDaniel Clowes who draws against the mainstream, made into an Academy Award-nominatedfilm in the 90s. Eight is also one ofthe magic numbers in nuclear physics but not science-literate, I shan't leadyou there. Being"behind the eight ball" is finding oneself in a difficult situationnot usually desired. "In adifficult situation" is a plus to Muslim friends that calls them to returnto Allah's side. (BTW Mufi is not aMufti.) Ayatul Kursi reminds one that to "remember Allah is to knowthat Allah will remember you". TheArabic word for "a clear sign of Allah" is "ayat" from where the word "Ayatollah" (who loves Allah) comes from. Ayatis also "love" in my Ilocano dialect! The metaphor "behind the eightball" derives from billiards where the black solid splits the table into1-7 and 9-15 numbered balls (solids and stripes), something I learned onesummer at the Y. Contestants pocketassigned balls before aiming for the 8. To be behind the eight ball before clearing the table of one's numbersis “being in a difficult place”. I am currently behind the eighth ball ("shame on you", a dear one quicklysays, "that is private information")but given the open-book nature of my existence, it hardly matters. I am not enamored by "eight". It has not brought me closer to Allah, blessed be the name! But it has enabled this reflection on mysituation and that is always a plus in managing it. BTW, I am happy and wealthy. Kapeesh? j'aime la vie yesterday, appreciate; tomorrow, anticipate; today, participate! in all, celebrate! -----Original Message----- From: wangzhimu2031 <wangzhimu2031@aol.com> To: oe <oe@lists.wedgeblade.net> Sent: Thu, Jun 4, 2015 9:25 pm Subject: Yangtze boat disaster I was in Chengdu, Sichuan two years ago, then moseyed over to Chongqing by the Chiangjiang (Yangtze) famous for its riverboats and cruises. I checked out the cost of sailing down the river from Chongqing to the mouth of the river near Shanghai. I could not afford a toe dip on the water! The 400-some elders age 50-70 on the cruise boat that just capsized off Nanjing would have been the type of cruise I would have joined. There is something to be said about being poor, but there is nothing comforting about not being one of the casualties. China retires its females at 50-55 and its males 55-60. Part of the reason I am no longer teaching at the University in Shenyang is that foreign teachers are also retired no later than 65. Those numbers are in the process of review as life expectancy has risen in recent years. Meanwhile, I head back to China for a month and then return to Saipan to start an English Immersion program for Chinese tourists. I might have to teach at the local High School World geography and history to augment the income as the tyranny of the economic had reared its ugly head once more. Those traveling this summer, stay safe. j'aime la vie yesterday, appreciate; tomorrow, anticipate; today, participate! in all, celebrate!